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" Lynn is 63 years old; Herb is 62. They&amp;#039;ve been married since 1988, a date they inscribed on their wedding bands so they wouldn&amp;#039;t forget. They got engaged five days after they met and were engaged for eight months before their wedding. Where did you meet? Herb: I&amp;#039;m a recovering alcoholic, but I wasn&amp;#039;t recovering at that point, though I was just out of a detox facility. I was 35 years old and I asked one of the professors in the department I was working in, &amp;quot;Do you know any nice Jewish girls?&amp;quot; He said, &amp;quot;No, but I&amp;#039;ll introduce you to Lynn, my wife&amp;#039;s cousin.&amp;quot; That Friday I went to shabbos dinner at his house and Lynn was there and I actually had a glass of scotch in my hand, and I was supposed to be in recovery. I was addicted to drugs, so I didn&amp;#039;t think I had an alcohol problem. I managed to fall asleep at the dinner table. Lynn: Charming \u2026 Herb: The next day I called her and said, &amp;quot;Would you like to go out on a date?&amp;quot; and she says, &amp;quot;OK, sure.&amp;quot; I took her to the Dairy Queen and I told her about the fact that I was in recovery and she goes, &amp;quot;Didn&amp;#039;t you have a drink last night?&amp;quot; I said, &amp;quot;Well, I didn&amp;#039;t know I wasn&amp;#039;t supposed to drink? It was just drugs, right?&amp;quot; and she said, &amp;quot;Well, no. It&amp;#039;s alcohol too,&amp;quot; and I said &amp;quot;OK, I won&amp;#039;t drink then.&amp;quot; And we had one more encounter after that and then we were engaged. We didn&amp;#039;t talk that much, actually. [Laugh] Surrounding the marriage, was there any drama? Herb: Oh, no. Lynn: I was marrying a Jewish doctor! Weeee!!! And I knew he had this little boy and he knew I had this little bit bigger boy and that I&amp;#039;d been single for seven or eight years at that point and I&amp;#039;d decided that I needed to catch somebody on the rebound because everyone that was not on the rebound and was my age was not very interesting. And he&amp;#039;s really cute. So you had instant chemistry? Herb: Yep, instant. I was supposed to be sober, but I&amp;#039;m really not that sober and I&amp;#039;m kind of a mess from here on out for the next two and a half years. I was using prescription drugs so it was &amp;quot;OK&amp;quot; because I&amp;#039;m a doctor. It was disastrous. So Lynn goes to, you know what Al-Anon [a group for friends and families of alcoholics] is? Lynn goes to Al-Anon. Lynn: I was practicing my program and he was being so difficult and he was hacking and it sounded like he had pneumonia but he wouldn&amp;#039;t go to the doctor. And you had no idea, Lynn? Lynn: I was in denial. It&amp;#039;s so interesting because I ran a treatment program. I had all kinds of book knowledge, but I couldn&amp;#039;t see what was under my nose. I had myself convinced he was depressed. And at that point, you were already doing Al-Anon for another reason? Lynn: I was doing Al-Anon when I met him! Herb: So fast-forward, I ended up in a nut ward in February of 1990 and I cleaned out there, I detoxed. Now, when you write all these prescriptions for yourself it takes a while for the wheels of justice to start grinding, but they do. So months later I&amp;#039;m at my little desk and in walks the state police, the DEA, and the attorney general, and I was fired from my job, I lost my hospital privileges, they suspended my medical license. This was Lynn&amp;#039;s birthday. Lynn, were you mortified? Lynn: I&amp;#039;d actually gone out to lunch with the woman who introduced us, she took me out for my birthday, and I came home and saw his car and his car did not belong in the driveway at two in the afternoon, so my heart sank. All I remember was going to an Al-Anon meeting and just whimpering, &amp;quot;Let me tell you about my birthday present!!!&amp;quot; Then the next guy goes, &amp;quot;I have a similar story to that!&amp;quot; That was the day I really got Al-Anon and and now I count it as my Al-Anon anniversary and every year is a testament to my recovery and how much better I&amp;#039;m doing. I love my birthday. So you two didn&amp;#039;t fight about it that day? Lynn: No, I was gonna take care of him still. He was barely recovered at this point. Herb: Life got a lot better. It didn&amp;#039;t happen overnight; it took another two years for me to get my medical license back. What&amp;#039;s been your biggest fight? Did anything come close to breaking you up? Herb: Yes! Yes. When I got back from treatment there was a spilled cup of coffee. And I was gonna get divorced over that. I was just so pissed and I stormed out. Lynn: And I said, &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s just spilled coffee!&amp;quot; and he&amp;#039;s going CRAZY! Herb: I stormed out of the house and I went to my sponsor and told him what happened, and he said when he was newly sober and was ricocheting off the walls and making a lot of noise about something inconsequential, his wife came over and waved this [points to his wedding band] under his nose and said, &amp;quot;You see this?! This means we&amp;#039;re on the same side!&amp;quot; I&amp;#039;m a pretty smart guy, but that was news to me. It was an insight that saved me from a lot of trouble. Lynn: He came home and said, &amp;quot;Can we take a walk? I&amp;#039;m just so sorry.&amp;quot; And he told me that story, and we both just cracked up and hugged. Herb: There are many things that used to irritate me and don&amp;#039;t anymore because I realize, Look what I&amp;#039;m getting for the bargain here. Yes, that stuff is irritating, but on the other hand I&amp;#039;ve got this tremendous wife, she&amp;#039;s a fabulous person. So these things that used to irritate me, it&amp;#039;s no big deal. Has your sex life changed over the course of your marriage? Herb: Yeah. We cuddle every night. Lynn: We do! Every night. [laughs] Cuddle? Lynn: It&amp;#039;s soooo nice! We say to each other, &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s just so cuddly and so warm and it feels so good and I like when our feet are rubbing!&amp;quot; and it&amp;#039;s just a completely different experience than that hot stuff. But it&amp;#039;s so gratifying and so wonderful that I wouldn&amp;#039;t trade it for anything. Cuddle and talk. It didn&amp;#039;t used to be cuddling and talking, there used to be like all this activity! And now I would say it&amp;#039;s a lot more intimate. What are you guys most looking forward to in your marriage? Lynn: [smiles at Herb] I think we&amp;#039;re there. Herb: We&amp;#039;re there! [laughs] We both love our jobs and we can take time off. We have two great dogs, kids that are very healthy and happy and they&amp;#039;re not married so there are no grandkids right now. So right now we can do whatever we want to do! What&amp;#039;s the best thing you&amp;#039;ve done for your marriage? Lynn: Go to Al-Anon. Work the program. Herb: Being in recovery. Also, I buy her roses every week. Lynn: He buys me roses every week! Herb: Except for Valentine&amp;#039;s Day, Sweetest Day, and Mother&amp;#039;s Day. I don&amp;#039;t buy them those weeks because they triple the price. Any advice for people getting married? Lynn: Schedule weekly dates; make it sacred time. For us, we have brunch every Saturday and Sunday, just the two of us. In the early years when the kids were home, we had at least one date a week. It&amp;#039;s a statement about the commitment to each other. We still go out on dates! This post has been updated to reflect that Al-Anon is a group for friends and families of alcoholics, not for alcoholics themselves. The Secret Life of Marrieds is a weekly series of interviews with married couples about the things no one tells you about marriage. Check back every Tuesday at 1 p.m. EST for a new interview. Previously: Why We Kept Our Marriage Secret for Years. Jane Marie is a writer living in Los Angeles. Follow her on Twitter. Photo credit: Courtesy of Herb and Lynn "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.cosmopolitan.com/sex-love/advice/a6949/secret-life-of-marrieds-lynn-herb/>