This Couple Waited Almost A Decade To Open Their Wedding Present

This couple waited almost a decade to open a wedding present. But before we start, please make sure to subscribe to MNR TV and hit the bell so you never miss any upload from us. Also, leave a like, right now! Most of us find it quite challenging to find that perfect wedding present for someone you care about. Even if the couple has a gift registry, many would rather give something off-list and This way, the gift will have a special meaning to the couple on a personal level. For Kathy and Brandon Gunn, a lovely couple from Northville, Michigan, they received one such wedding gift. However, they felt that the present was so unique that they left it unopened for over nine years. Once they did open it, secrets...its secrets had more of an impact than they ever could have imagined. Brandon and Kathy Gunn are a wonderful married couple from Northville, Michigan, located just outside of Detroit. One evening, nearly a decade after their own marriage, the Gunns found themselves preparing for a friend's wedding. As such, the two were talking about what present to pick up for their friends. We were talking about how excited we were to attend an upcoming wedding in Kalamazoo, where we met and went to college, Kathy said. As the two talked about the present, they started discussing gifts from their own wedding. Brandon and his wife spoke about one wedding present in particular, the strangest gift either of them had received in their entire lives. In particular, Brandon and Kathy Gunn discussed a wedding present that, believe it or not, they had not opened in the ten years since their wedding. That's right, of course it sounds rather strange, if not downright rude, to receive a wedding present and not open it for nearly a decade. Meanwhile, since the couple was discussing the gift, it's not as though they had accidentally forgotten about it or lost it. In fact, Brandon and Kathy knew precisely where the gift was. However, the couple had an excellent reason for not opening the gift for all these years. You see, the present had also come with very specific instructions explaining when to open it. As you might imagine, Brandon and Kathy's 2007 wedding was a sight to behold. Nearly 300 friends and family came from all over the United States to celebrate with the couple in Michigan. As it was a wedding, the newlyweds received plenty of gifts to commemorate their special day. However, out of all the presents, one stood out in particular. Kathy's great-aunt, Allison, gave the couple a wrapped box with precise instructions attached, Do not open until your first disagreement, read the accompanying note from Kathy's relative. The presentation itself was very unique and it's not the typical gift, Kathy said to ABC News. Had Brandon and Kathy really not disagreed in nine years? We need to be clear, the instructions said to open the present after the couple's first disagreement, not merely wait 10 years to do so. Even for the strongest couples in the world, going 10 years without a single disagreement seems downright impossible. However, Brandon and Kathy are not claiming to have a perfect union. Like any marriage, we faced stressful times and obstacles, finances, jobs, kids, etc. That tested our partnership, Kathy said. There were even a couple of instances where we both considered giving up, but we never opened the box. I honestly think that we both avoided turning to the box because it would have symbolized our failure. Meanwhile, Kathy's great-aunt, Allison, who gave them the present, could not believe the couple's incredible patience. While those closest to Brandon and Kathy knew how patient the two of them could be, great-aunt, Allison, the gift-giver, could not. In fact, Kathy could also not believe that she and her husband had made it as long as they had. She had predicted that they would open it within the first year or two, have a good laugh, and move on. That obviously did not happen. Years passed on and the box remained unopened. Then, things started to bother Allison so much that she actually decided to head over to Brandon and Kathy's house and talk to them about when they intended to finally open her wedding present. Just two years into Brandon and Kathy Gunn's marriage and Kathy's great-aunt, Allison, could not understand why her niece had not opened the so she called her niece and asked if she could come over. Allison intended to get to the bottom of the mystery. She could never have expected that Brandon and Kathy would wait another eight years to unveil the present. However, after a little bit of explanation, Kathy managed to convince her great-aunt that she and Brandon had good reasons for not opening the presents. However, another member of the family was not as convinced. After her conversation with Kathy and Brandon, Allison felt a lot better about the whole ordeal. However, Kathy's mom, seen above, still had a very legitimate question. My mom was like, Kathy, what if there's food in there or something? If that was the case, the wedding present might be well and truly ruined. Thankfully, we did ask Allison to make sure there wasn't anything perishable in there or time-sensitive, Kathy said to ABC News. As stated, following that conversation, the box remained unopened for another eight years and it wasn't only due to the couple's love for one another. It also had to do with their fiercely competitive spirits. The years continued to pass and Brandon and Kathy still did not open the wedding present from Allen, despite the occasional disagreement or a rough patch. While they had emotional reasons to not open the gift, they also had some petty ones. My husband and I are both very competitive people, she said. We love a challenge. The presentation itself was very unique and it's not the typical gift. We kind of set it aside because it was special to us. However, with every passing day, it almost became harder to open the present. Brandon and Kathy seemed to be waiting for that elusive, perfect moment, and some felt that moment would never come for the couple. As anyone can tell you, the longer you put something off, the harder it becomes to do it. Meanwhile, the unopened present had become something of a comfort to Kathy and Brandon. We've obviously had tons of disagreements, Kathy said, but we didn't want to turn to the box because once you open it, you don't have it. And then what do you do? Opening the box meant crossing a line neither was entirely comfortable with crossing. The couple would ask themselves, was it really time to open the box? Kathy said. What if this isn't our worst fight? Or what if there's a worse one ahead of us and we don't have our box? However, that did not stop others from becoming impatient. It's not hard to see why Kathy's great aunt Allison felt scared that Brandon and Kathy would never open the gift, or perhaps didn't want to. However, nothing could be further from the truth. The funny thing? The gift that meant the very most to me was still sitting in a closet, unopened, Kathy explained in an interview. The wedding present held so much meaning not only because of the day Kathy and Brandon received it, but also who gave it. You see, just a year before the couple's wedding, Allison's longtime husband of 50 years and one of Kathy's favorite relatives, Uncle Bill, had passed away. To her and Brandon, the wedding present represented their lasting connection to him. Because of the terribly sad passing of Uncle Bill after his 50 years of marriage to Allison, Brandon and Kathy felt significant pressure to wait until the perfect moment to open the gift and reveal its contents. And even though the instructions said do not open until your first disagreement, the couple felt like opening it during a negative episode in We didn't want to ruin the importance of taking that in by opening it after a silly fight, Kathy said to the Today Show. However, the couple was starting to feel too curious about the contents of the box. As my great uncle Bill would say, nothing is ever so bad that it couldn't get worse, Kathy added. The couple decided the time had finally come. Sitting on their porch, talking about the unopened present and wondering what they should get their friends, Brandon and Kathy Gunn had a realization. 10 years had been long enough. Brandon had a great idea. Why not open the gift not as a solution to a disagreement but as a celebration of their healthy marriage? If we've made it this far, said Brandon, I don't think we need the box to save us. After 10 long years, Brandon and Kathy felt they had finally arrived at the perfect time to open the present from Aunt Allison and Uncle Bill. However, neither were prepared for what they would find inside. Finally, after nearly a decade of waiting to open the wedding present and the rest of the Gunn family going almost insane, Kathy and Brandon decided to open the mysterious gift. With their children alongside them, Brandon brought the present out of the closet and put it on the table. Taking a deep breath, the couple started opening the gift. We thought there would be a long, heartful letter about the struggles Allison and Bill had faced, Kathy said afterward. However, when they lifted the lid and revealed the contents, a strange look of confusion washed over Kathy and Brandon's faces. What was this peculiar collection of knickknacks and paper? Opening the gift, Brandon and Kathy found a very odd assortment of objects in the mysterious wedding present. First, they pulled out another box that contained some ordinary, albeit a tad fancy, bathroom items like lotion and hand towels. Next to this sat two wine glasses and a matching vase. Then at the bottom, they found two bundles of cash with small notes attached. Brandon and Kathy felt quite confused by the items, as you probably do. Fortunately, the handwritten messages did provide some answers. In fact, the two notes that Kathy and her spouse found provided all the additional instructions they needed. At first glance, Kathy and Brandon did not understand Allison and Bill's gift. However, the very first note revealed all. Wrapped around the first bundle of cash was a small sticky note addressed to Kathy, reading, Go get a pizza, shrimp, or something you both like. Get a bath ready. Meanwhile, the note addressed to her husband stated, Go get flowers and a bottle of wine. As it turned out, much of the Gunn family had been right all along. We assume that the contents of the box held the key to saving a marriage, the mom wrote. An age-old trick, unbeknownst to us rookies. Still, the present had given them so much more than just a few old secrets. After all this time, Kathy and Brandon looked at Allison like some sort of marriage expert. After all, my great aunt and uncle had been married for nearly half a century, Kathy continued. It seemed appropriate to expect that they would unveil some secrets of the trade to the newlyweds. So we thought the box would save us, and in a way it did. The box went beyond what I believe my great aunt had intended. It was by far the greatest wedding gift of all, Kathy said. For nine years, even without being opened, the box had still been a gift to Kathy and Brandon, just in a different way than most expected. For nine years and three moves, that box sat high on a shelf in various closets gathering dust, Kathy wrote in a Facebook post after opening the wedding present. Yet it somehow taught us about tolerance, understanding, compromise, and patience. Our marriage strengthened as we became best friends, partners, and teammates, Kathy added. Today we decided to open that box because I finally had a realization. I realized that the tools for creating and maintaining strong, healthy marriage were never within that box. They were within us. Of course, after Kathy started telling people that she opened the box, everyone wanted to know the same thing. How did her aunt Allison react to the news? Just a few months after opening the box and her initial Facebook post, she updated everyone with some news. First, she had contacted Aunt Allison and told her the story. As you might imagine, the great aunt felt delighted to know that the present had meant so much to her niece. Moreover, she wished them as successful a marriage as she had enjoyed. Allison thought it was amazing, Kathy added. She also thought it was a great story, but she thought we were crazy. She knew it was a special gift but didn't realize just how special it became to us. Meanwhile, Kathy had also taken the few months to reflect even more on the importance of the wedding present. I felt if we hadn't opened the box yet, we've got everything we need to make this work, Kathy told ABC News in 2016. When you're young and learning to be married and compromise and all of that, we often thought the contents of the box would reunite us. Now, Kathy says she finally realized the true meaning of the wedding present. I think the true story was working it out for ourselves, that there wasn't any gift that was going to reunite us or make it better, Kathy said. It was something that we were going to have to do ourselves. However, the story of Brandon, Kathy, Allison and the wedding present does not end there. During an interview with Huffington Post, Kathy reflected on what she had learned over nearly a decade of marriage. Life throws so many twists and turns at all of us outside of marriage and dealing with those problems can be difficult without someone to count on, she said. Brandon is my constant, Kathy continued. No matter what struggles I am faced with, I know that I can always count on him to be in my corner and me in his. It's so much easier to get through life when you have someone that will always be there for you and that would do anything for you, no matter the time or day. Kathy and Brandon are incredibly grateful for the journey the wedding present brought them on and all it taught them. Today, the couple feels closer than ever and expect their love story to continue forever and ever. Not only that, but they hope that their story can inspire others. I hope it will inspire people to reassess their situations and think about their love, why they got married in the first place, Kathy said to ABC News. When you're young and learning to be married and compromise and all of that, we often thought the contents of the box would reunite us. It was something that we were going to have to do ourselves. However, the couple had no idea just how their story would literally inspire people all around the world. Three months after Kathy wrote the Facebook post in August 2016, Kathy and Brandon's story took yet another interesting turn. You see, the popular lifestyle site Love What Matters picked up on the tale and shared it with their followers on social media. From there, the story went completely viral, catapulting Brandon, Kathy, Allison, the wedding present, and even Uncle Bill to internet stardom. As of this writing, the Love What Matters post has garnered over 20,000 likes and over 4,000 shares on Facebook. From there, Kathy's original post on her personal Facebook has also taken off and the family is still receiving positive comments to this day. People worldwide felt incredibly touched and inspired by the tale of the wedding present and Brandon and Kathy's patience. I think the gift worked just the way your aunt intended it to, wrote Facebook user Susan Davies. You didn't open it at your first disagreement but left it on the shelf where you had to see it every time you opened that closet. It was a silent reminder to you both and probably in some ways acted as a set of brakes when you did disagree about something, Davies added, keeping the anger level to a slow burn instead of a volcano. Elsewhere, others could not stop gushing over the gift itself and the thought that Aunt Allison had put into it. While many praised Brandon and Kathy Gunn's patience, others felt ecstatic about Allison's gift. Wow, Bob Wiegman wrote in the Facebook comment section. This is the wisest, kindest, most loving gift your aunt could have given you. This is brilliant and wonderful and I hope you know how very much your aunt loved you to do this. Thank you for sharing this precious gift with us. After Love What Matters and Kathy herself shared her story, others felt compelled to share stories of similar unusual gifts. Believe it or not, there are people from all around the world that have been given loving gifts that become emotional tentpoles in their lives. One Facebook user, Tracy Ciccola, decided to share her own story on Kathy's post. We had the same kind of gift, she wrote. The minister that married us almost 16 years ago gave us a bag of M&Ms. He told us if we ever argue, we are to open the bag together and savor one at a time, letting it slowly melt in our mouth while we reflect on what we have built together. The bag still sits on my husband's dresser drawer, unopened 15 plus years later, Ciccola added. Ciccola's words were somehow echoed by another Facebook user, Pauline Weyer, who wrote about the wedding gift she had received from her grandmother. Just like Kathy and Brandon's, Weyer's item had come with specific instructions. Kathy and Brandon soon learned that they were not the only ones who had waited a long time to open a unique wedding gift. In fact, they discovered that there were many people out there who lived through very similar situations. One of those women was Pauline Weyer who contacted the couple over Facebook. My grandmother gave us two precious tea cups and saucers with several kinds of tea to sip whenever we have struggles, Weyler explained. Unfortunately, we had to throw out the tea before it was ever used due to expiration and still we have the beautiful tea cups and haven't fought yet. Not only were Kathy and Brandon Gunn contacted by people who had not opened wedding presents for a long time, but they were also approached by those who had participated in giving similar gifts. Since Aunt Allison was a tad too old for Facebook, these excellent gift givers decided to contact the couple to tell their remarkable stories. For instance, Facebook user Cheryl Stemple revealed that she had once participated in a Two years ago, when my niece got married, we did a little something along the same lines, Stemple wrote, but what was the unique thoughtful gift that Stemple had given to her niece? Stemple then went into detail about her kind wedding present. Everyone that attended the wedding wrote a special memory of the couple, words of advice, or something great about the day they got married. She explained, I folded the strip into lucky origami stars and placed the When the couple were having an argument, they were to sit down together and open a star and focus on the words that people gave them on their special day, Stemple explained. They say that in times when they are feeling angry or hurt, it helps them to remember what brought them together. Meanwhile, in another part of the world, Adrian Pierce also had a present he had never opened. We all know someone who ended up marrying their high school sweetheart. Some of them stay together, others don't, just like most relationships. However, while some don't end up with their teenage flames, they still think of them from time to time. One man, Adrian Pierce, he had an excellent reason to think of his high school girlfriend, Vicki Allen. When they broke up during their junior year back in the 1970s, Allen gave Pierce a goodbye Christmas gift. 47 years later, the gift remained unopened. Every year, Pierce placed the Christmas gift under the tree, but could never bring himself to open it. Then, after nearly 50 years, everything changed. Forced to finally take the plunge, Pierce opened the Christmas gift in unique, dramatic fashion. Little did he know, opening the gift would start an unexpected chain of events. Read on to discover one of the most surprising stories of the year. In 1970, Adrian Pierce was a student at George S. Henry Secondary School, located in suburban Toronto. There, he had a pretty standard high school experience. He developed a love of the arts, and like many others, participated in extracurriculars. Pierce did fine in school, though it was never his strong suit. All in all, he had a pretty good time in high school. Pierce, like many other high schoolers, also had a few relationships over his four years at George S. Henry. Some lasted a short while, while others lasted much longer. However, one of Pierce's relationships would change his life forever. One gift from one girlfriend would follow him for nearly 50 years. To see what happened next, click Next Post below.