I’ve been separated from my husband for ten weeks, but our marriage is stronger than ever. Let me explain.

As part of the MBA program I’m in, students do an internship between the first and second year with the hopes of getting a job offer at the end of the summer. I was fortunate enough to have an opportunity to work in Omaha, Nebraska for ConAgra Foods as part of their brand management team. It was a golden opportunity with a company I respected and admired. Unfortunately, Chad is in school as well and needed to take classes over the summer so we would graduate at the same time this coming April. We decided we’d do the ten weeks of my internship apart, with him remaining in Utah while I ventured out to eastern Nebraska, thirteen hours away.

He made the long drive with me the weekend before I started and flew back to Utah the Monday my internship began. Other than the final return drive back to the Beehive State, the only time I saw him in person over the summer was over Independence Day weekend. It could have been a lot worse — we don’t have kids and we were both fairly occupied with school assignments, work, and church activities. There was even a part of me that was looking forward to the breathing space physical separation would allow. I’ve always needed time to recharge on my own and I imagined the summer would have long stretches of time with me reading books, cooking food only I would want to eat, and watching period dramas Chad rarely was in the mood to watch. I knew I would miss him, but the benefits still gleamed as I would have a glimpse of selfish single-dom for a while.

However, I was unprepared for what those ten weeks would bring. Our nearly two year-old marriage was pressed through the wringer as we tried to compensate for the distance through phone calls, Skype, text messages, and snail mail. This blog post is not in any way endorsed by or affiliated with Skype, but that video service was a life saver. I cannot sing its praises enough. Chad doesn’t do well on the phone and tends to lapse silent without visual cues as an aid. On Skype, however, we would spend hours just talking, sharing random links we found on the internet, watching the other person prepare a meal or get ready for bed, and a variety of other random activities. Sometimes the conversation would pause and we’d quietly do other tasks, still keeping the connection live as we intermittently observed each other.

As mentioned above, my marriage is still in its infancy. Until this summer, I didn’t realize how much of it is unspoken. I missed the silent observation the most those ten weeks, and my selfish single-dom felt empty and incomplete without him there. Just being in Chad’s presence with no words necessary — just being and existing in the same physical space — was a benefit of marriage I had failed to appreciate beforehand. If nothing else, the separation helped me realize this fact and has made me more grateful for it now that we’re back together. The space in between conversations and physical displays of affection, between cooking together and cleaning up and creating our monthly budget, has become sacred to me. Even now, as I’m writing this blog post, Chad sits quietly next to me, reading a book, and we are content. While I wouldn’t care to experience an extended separation again, my marriage is stronger for it. Separation, for better or for worse, begets clarity, and I am grateful for the vision.

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Does absence really make the heart grow fonder? Have you ever had a separation that has drawn you closer to your spouse?