After 20 years we faced the ultimate test of marriage – a trip to Ikea!

WE faced the ultimate test as a couple this week – it was not pretty.

After twenty years of marriage, it’s fair to say we have had our ups and downs. We survived lockdown ( just about), the sleep deprived days of having small babies, the sleep deprived nights of having teenagers. It’s not been easy but we’ve managed to come out the other side.

This however was a test like no other and one that left me emotionally and physically drained. This week for the first time, we did Ikea, together as a couple. And I can tell you one thing if we want to stay a couple we won’t be repeating the experience.

Up until last Monday I was an Ikea virgin! Don’t know why. I suppose, a trip to a massive furniture store never held much appeal to me. But down through the years, once I confessed this to friends they all seemed really shocked.

‘What?? You’ve never been to Ikea?! Are you serious?? Oh My God you have to go as soon as possible. You’ll love it,’ Obviously my friends do not know me as well as they think they do because NO. I did not love it. I hated every single bloody minute to the point where I’d rather chew off my arm than have to go there again.

It was kind of exciting to begin with. We hired a van and it was a Monday so it felt a bit like we were on the mitch from school. But then we got there and Honest to God, I actually wondered had we taken a wrong turn and ended up in the queue for a concert at Croke Park. There were hundreds of people all queuing in orderly fashion to get in. Does nobody work any more or did everybody just get the same idea at the same time?

We thought we were clever. I had made a list before we got there but I kept going off piste much to Himself ’s annoyance. ‘We don’t need 1000 paper napkins,’ he told me. Nor would he let me buy the €2 wine glasses or the dinky little coffee cups that they were practically giving away.

The problem was, we didn’t check our list so when we got to the warehouse half the stuff we wanted wasn’t in stock. He blamed me, I blamed him (after all he’d been before) and we ended up in a stand off which resulted in me storming off with the trolley, wrestling random bits of flatpack onto said trolley and declaring they would do.

It was all picture and no sound on the journey home in our little white van and matters haven’t improved as we now have three chests of drawers that don’t fit in our bedrooms and are currently residing in our hall, posing a fire hazard and lethal obstacle course.

If we get through this, we’ll get through anything.

THERE WERE HUNDREDS QUEUING TO GET IN. DOES NOBODY WORK ANY MORE OR DID EVERYBODY JUST GET THE SAME IDEA AT THE SAME TIME?