I asked my husband to do a guest post for me and boy, did he deliver! I hope you enjoy what he has to say as much as I did.
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Hello Substance and Soul blog readers and all you anonymous folks!
Samantha has mentioned me several times in her blog but for those who do not know me, my name is Paul Wetterholm! I am the Husband who loves and supports Samantha in her endeavors.
I grew up in Bakersfield, CA with my mom (Beverly) and dad (Mark) and two brothers (Joel & Neal) and big sister (Amber). To those of you who don’t care for Bakersfield, I don’t care for you! Not really, but I did enjoy living in Bakersfield all the way up through high school. I am a jock who loves to follow many sports like baseball, basketball, and golf but my favorite sport of all is tennis. I started playing in high school and went to Cal Lutheran to play with my brother! If it weren’t for my brother’s positive influence on me, I would not have gone to school there and would not have met Samantha. I got to meet Samantha in my junior year and my life changed for the best.
Samantha and I were married in July of 2011 and it still seems like yesterday. I wanted to write and give you all a perspective of what it is like to be me and be married to a dental student/blogger/artist/music lover. In upcoming posts, I also want to share some of my perspective on how to be a supportive husband, and finally I want to maybe talk about some weird things because I have always been a little weird. Since I do not read many blogs, I do not have a clue on how to do this but I am going to give it a shot!
Here are the pleasures of marrying my lovely dentist Samantha (insert smiley/shinny teethy face here):
Opportunity to go somewhere new. Being married to Samantha meant I knew I was committing to a life of new experiences involving our style of living and where we lived. At first, I did not like the idea of her looking into dental schools all over the county from Boston to Fort Lauderdale but then I asked myself, “When else would I get the opportunity to live and adapt to a new environment and experience this?” I am someone who is close to family and certainly would like to at least have the opportunity to visit on weekends whenever I chose but marrying Samantha gave me more priorities in life and a new perspective. My hesitant thoughts switched to those of opportunism and I gave Samantha the green light to pick whichever school/city would work best for her career. My career as an Accountant allows me to have some flexibility in where I work because there seems to be a need for my work everywhere! San Francisco has been a great experience so far with Samantha and for my career. I have worked at a non-profit chartered school district called Aspire Public Schools since we moved up here and they really like me here!
My teeth are obviously going to be taken care of! Samantha’s skills as a Dentist are growing so rapidly at the moment as she has taken of the task of working every day in clinic treating patients. I have had to opportunity to visit her on two occasions for check-ups and they were wonderful. She is very thorough in her analysis of not only my teeth by my health has a whole. She is very gentle and makes you feel comfortable and helps you understand what exactly she is doing when she is examining you. I think this is what makes a good Dentist, someone who cares also for your well-being and makes you feel comfortable. I know she will take care of me for years to come and will also have a positive effect on the many others she will get to treat.
Yummy meals and desserts! Samantha is quite creative when it comes to making a dinner for us or an exquisite dessert. She knows how to take a recipe and make it work even if we don’t have the exact ingredients needed. I am consistently satisfied with the meals she has put together and I only wish she had more time to put together more! Samantha is also able put together one mean dessert. One of my favorites has to be her crêpes! They are so delicious with Nutella.
Great Photographs and Art. As many of you blog readers know, Samantha has knack for taking a great photo or creating art projects. This is one area where we would be lost if it were me making the decisions. I have very little creativity when it comes to creating a work of art and I do not have skills in photography. If you know us well, you know Samantha will rarely allow me to take a picture of us or anything! Back to Samantha…she is able to provide us with great tangible memories we will be able to have forever. Whether it is one of the many scrapbooks she creates or the wall art using our cards, they all are so fun to look at from time to time and will be there whenever we want to remember a special occasion. I am especially thankful for this pleasure she brings to our lives because I know it is not something that comes easy.
Well thanks for reading and I’ll catch you next time, Paul.