At the reception we discovered with delight that the bride’s mother had arranged to seat all the single people at the same dinner table so we could “mingle.” “Who knows what might happen? It wasn’t long before we began a long-distance courtship, got engaged, and then married.

Our wedding took place just 14 months from the day we met, and that was almost 30 years, three kids, two dogs and three mortgages ago.

Not long ago, I pulled out the shoebox and reread each letter, experiencing all over again the excitement of a new relationship, the uncertainty of reciprocated feelings and the hesitancy to let my heart run away with me.

I remember constantly asking myself, “Does he really like me? ” I also remember reading and rereading every card to decipher any hidden encouragement that he might truly like me as much as I was growing to like him.

It says, “Love is Patient.” Although that is about as obvious as it gets, somehow I never understood it.

Until one day last year when I thought, “Wow, love is patient. 1 Corinthians 13:4 is a great verse to meditate on if you are struggling with establishing your boundaries. We want your feedback: What do you think of Hannah’s boundaries?

There comes a time when you need to have a serious conversation, with yourself and your significant other.

Of course, I don’t mean you have to literally talk to yourself – that would be strange.

And what I also know now is that it was a smart move.I do mean that you must seriously contemplate and establish your boundaries.I had to have this talk too, and I probably did it a little late.Once you enter a relationship, well at least once I did, I realized there is a lot more physical interaction between kissing and sex.You have to decide where your “line” is before you are put into a compromising situation.In fact, now I can’t believe how obvious it was that he was falling in love with me. What I know now that I didn’t realize then was that I had set some pretty strong emotional boundaries in place.I had experienced heartbreak before, and I certainly didn’t want to experience that again.I still have every precious card and letter we wrote to one another during that time.They are lovingly arranged in chronological order and tucked away in a shoebox in our storage shed.Purity will strengthen the marital emotional bond and commitment as well.The Bible verse I believe best explains the reasons for purity is, 1 Corinthians 13:4.by *Hannah Packham Holding hands, kissing, sex, where do you draw your line? Although, I’ve only dated one guy, that’s about all it takes to learn some of the most important lessons about relationships: everything from communication to kissing.This is an important question that even I tried to avoid answering. How are you supposed to know where you draw your line? The boundaries of purity seemed simple to me before I started dating: don’t have sex until you’re married. Seems pretty easy; however, I found it is much more complicated than that.The last thing you want is to not have thought about it and end up doing something you regret, simply because you didn’t think.Knowing your boundaries ahead of time will save so much unnecessary heartache.