The biggest thing that sustained me when I was young was my feeling of independence and knowing that I could take care of myself because I was doing it. I had a long marriage. We were together for a total of 62 years, 59 of them married. I would not have let my husband dictate to me what I could or could not do because I had a good sense of that and he knew it. Mostly we worked together. Of course we had our disagreements. Everyone does. But we worked things out and never dictated ultimatums.