"Can I Ask You a Personal Question?"

That question, like the statement "We need to talk," instantly creates so much panic. It's just like, being thrown out on stage in front of an audience without script or instruction.

"Can I ask you a personal question," my ten-year-old brother said, "why did you marry a man so much older than you?"

That question is kind of weird for me. I feel like I am being told that I have some sort of strange fetish that I need to get over. I know this relationship is pretty abnormal, the age gap is over eight times larger an the ideal gap. The stereotypical older man and younger woman relationship is made up of a pervert and a gold digger.

My husband is the furthest thing from a pervert and I can show you paper evidence that I am not a gold digger.

The question is weird for me because I didn't marry my husband because of his age or despite his age. I didn't set out to marry an older man, I married an older man because the man I fell in love with happened to be older than me.

Before even going out on a date, we both thought long and hard about the realities, morals, and difficulties that would come with a relationship such as ours. In the end, we decided it was worth it and (so far!) have not regretted that decision at all.

I feel like a white girl in the '60's getting hitched to a black man. There is nothing wrong with it but there is a lot of social stigma surrounding it.