The often over used cliché saying, “You don’t marry the person you meet in high school," is rather daunting-especially when you’ve been with that same “person you met in high school” two years after both of you have graduated. Trust me, I would know-- me and my high school boyfriend of three years hear it a little too often. This poses the question; can high school sweethearts actually make it work all those years after high school has ended?

Well, the answer is yes.

In fact, high school sweethearts have a 78 percent success rate. That is nearly double the rate of post college couples who not only become married, but stay married. Only a mere 2 percent of married couples met in high school, but the number of failed marriages within that 2 percent is less than 25 percent. Now I gather that 2 percent doesn’t seem like a very large number, but it is important to keep in mind that this measly 2 percent is 2 percent of the entire world’s population. That means approximately 1.5 million people are married to their high school sweethearts and out of that 1.5 million, only 330,000 of those marriages will end in divorce.

While it can seem a little strange to say that you met your husband or wife in high school, which for some of you readers may seem like ages ago, it is also rather rewarding. I say rewarding because unlike most marriages, your partner not only knew your young and adolescent stage, but grew alongside of you in those defining years.

Your high school sweetheart knows every corky, embarrassing, happy and even the sad moments that have taken place in your life because he was there too- either helping make the memory or just being your shoulder to cry on.

Your high school sweetheart has a ridiculous and unlimited amount of patience because you’ve been testing his/hers for the last decade or so.

They may be labeled as your high school sweetheart, lover, boyfriend and even husband but they are always first and foremost your best friend.

He or she knows how you operate and even how you shut down.

It may seem strange to say that you met the man/woman you will spend the rest of your life with in what seemed like a four year prison sentence- the one we all had to serve, High School. However, at the same time, there is not a single other place on this planet I would have rather wanted to meet the love of my life. High school- I guess not all dreams have to die there because that’s where my happily ever after was born.