On Wednesdays, Black Love features couple’s first-person stories of why they said “I do.” While we know that marriage is not just about the wedding day but the life you share together, we want to know why you decided to walk down the aisle and take that step toward forever. Want your story to be heard next? Email our editor at yasmine@blacklove.com.
Why I Said I Do: Christina & Edward (Eddie) Sledge
We knew our union was predestined from the start. We were even born in the same hospital and crossed paths many times before we finally met. Fate finally brought us together in high school. Eddie had to move after a devastating house fire displaced his family. That move brought him to the high school that I was enrolled in. The funny thing was I was not zoned to that school but, my father wanted me to go to school there.
We met in high school in Brooklyn, NY, in September 1992. We broke up right before graduation in June 1996, but still kept in touch through letters and my brother for almost four years when Eddie was a soldier in the U.S. Army while I was a student at Temple University.
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We both had failed relationships separately. We finally met again on Christmas Eve 1999 after almost four years of being apart. Eddie proposed impromptu without a ring on that Christmas Eve night because he didn’t want to be apart from me anymore. I said yes, because I knew he was the man that I was meant to marry. We wanted a big Christmas wedding in 2000 but couldn’t afford it. So we eloped two months later on February 18, 2000 in Philly. The wedding ceremony cost $99. We were so broke that I wore my cream-colored prom dress, and Eddie wore his Army Class A uniform. After the ceremony, we only had two quarters. We have been married ever since for 23 years.
We eloped because we didn’t want anything to keep us apart. We put our faith in God and each other because we knew it was a predestined union. I said I do because I knew he was the only man I would love because, when we were apart, I compared every man to him.
Eddie said “I do” because he couldn’t see his future without me in it. As he says, “I needed this woman in my life.”
After 15 years, on July 18, 2015 we finally had a proper wedding/vow renewal, including our family and friends. It was beautiful to share that moment with our loved ones and our daughters. Then for our 20th wedding anniversary, we had another vow renewal. The Christmas wedding we always wanted 20 years early at Disney World on December 23, 2019. During our 23-year marriage, we both obtained Bachelors’s and Masters’s degrees and have been blessed with two phenomenal daughters.
We can’t imagine our lives without each other. We have been blessed to find each other and build a family and life together. Our story is a testament to follow your heart and let your faith in each other guide you.
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