Courtesy of Marta Hiatt

By Marta Hiatt, PhD
 
Does love grow stronger the longer a couple has been together, or is it often just the opposite? Does familiarity breed contempt, or do people deepen their bond as they mature together? Sometimes it’s a mixture of both.

Young people, after a few years of marriage, sometimes wonder what they might have missed by getting married and if a more suitable partner is out there somewhere. This is especially true as they endure the ongoing struggles of adapting to living with another person, a process often complicated by the burdens of rearing children.

When people fall in love at an older age, they have had a lot more life experience and are usually better able to handle the challenges of a relationship. They have a more realistic view of life and have relinquished some of their fantasies of the ideal person. Older couples know there’s more to a relationship than just fluttering hearts or hot sex, and they take a more common-sense approach to love. Falling in love in the sunset years is less problematic because couples realize that they may not have many years left to enjoy each other’s company, whereas younger people may wonder if they can sustain a relationship for 50 or 60 years with the same person—and at times may long for their freedom. When you’re a senior citizen, you appreciate who you’re with more fully because you know your time together is limited.

Older couples are usually more willing to work out problems, rather than just bail out and go on to the next person. After many years of life experience, mature people are better able to separate what’s important from what’s not and have learned how to adapt to life’s inevitable problems. When retired, they also have more time to just be together and enjoy some of life’s pleasures, which may have been denied them when they were busy with evolving life paths. Young newlyweds are often more focused on developing their careers and bringing up their children, which can become more important than the couple’s relationship and detract from their intimacy.

Another aspect of mature love is that older people are often less self-centered and less focused on what they can get out of life. They have the maturity to be more concerned about their partner’s happiness—whether it’s taking care of each other through illnesses, financial hardships, or family crises. When an older person remarries after a divorce (or maybe even two), he or she usually has learned what it takes to be a better spouse and how to build a stronger bond that makes both partners feel loved and feel good about themselves.

The life experience that mature couples have gives them a more spiritual and expanded consciousness that better enables them to value that bond. They’ve lived long enough to realize that love is not static; instead, it fluctuates greatly during long-term relationships, and negative things are bound to happen over time. Older people have usually dealt with so many problems throughout the course of their lives that they are more resilient and better prepared to deal with them in an enduring relationship.

Of course, these are generalizations—there will always be some exceptions—but we should never discount how deep the love of an older couple can be.