Why has our marriage and stepfamily lasted so long

Tony says, "Dogged persistence!" I guess you could say that we can both be very stubborn, but we both wanted to make this relationship work.

As well as a deepening love for each other, we are friends. We share common interests - a love of reading and history, having a dog, visiting old houses and, more recently, travelling abroad. We have enjoyed going on the same training courses together. We also share the same faith and belief system. We've grown comfortable with each other. But we can still hotly disagree on some things and get frustrated with each other.

Looking back, the early years were more challenging. With five children in the house, the practicalities of everyday living took up lots of time and energy.

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