A Message To Young Couples: Talk Often, Openly, & Honestly

If I could give one piece of advice to younger couples just starting out, it would be this: Talk. Talk about everything.

Not just the big-ticket stuff like money, family, or plans for the future – include the small, awkward things too. The things that feel too petty or too complicated to bring up. Your different opinions on world issues, your weaknesses that maybe your family doesn’t know about, the strengths you want to keep using, the lack of kitchen skills, even your naivety in the bedroom!

Because it’s the little silences that do the most damage over time. They creep in, set up camp, and before you know it, you’re living side by side instead of together.

If you’re in the early days of marriage, please learn from that. Talk often. Talk honestly.

About your hopes, fears, frustrations, needs, and dreams. Even when it’s uncomfortable. Especially then. Because silence doesn’t solve anything—it just buries the problem until it starts to rot.

When it falters, love can still exist, but it struggles to breathe. So don’t wait until the words come too late. Talk now. Listen with patience. Love with intention. That’s how you build something that lasts.

I write this not from regret, but from growth and new understanding – and to share.

Life has a way of teaching us through the wreckage we’d rather forget. These days, I don’t chase perfection – I chase understanding. I’ve learnt that honesty, vulnerability, and a willingness to listen are far more powerful than pride. While I can’t rewrite the past, I can use it to light the path ahead – for myself, and maybe for someone else walking a similar road. Don’t give up on love, on her, on yourself, or the whatever the future may hold. Talk often, if only to ask yourself what else you can do to repair, resolve and restore the love.

When I look back on my own marriage, what hurts me most isn’t the arguments – it’s mostly my behaviour. My attitude. My mindset. The way I spiralled inward to avoid conflict rather than stepping toward it. I could never quite find the right words, so I said nothing. I worked best under pressure, which meant I left too much until the last minute. I didn’t see the person beside me for who she was: someone supporting me, carrying more than I realised. I didn’t appreciate her the way she deserved.

Most of that, as I now understand, came from how my brain works: Klinefelter’s Syndrome means my mind processes things differently. I say this not an excuse, it’s because it is recognised as part of the puzzle. I always cared deeply, yet I often couldn’t show it clearly. In the last few years of our marriage, the pressure and confusion built up until I fell into a hole of depression. She didn’t know how to handle it. And neither did I. We’d built a catch-22 between us – each waiting for the other to make the first move toward connection.