Madison Prewett Says She Felt Like Her Old Life Was 'Dying' While Adjusting to Marriage with Grant Troutt

After working through a "hard" first few months of marriage together, 'The Love Everybody Wants' author tells PEOPLE that the couple are now "each other's very best friends"

Married life has gotten off to a great start for Madison Prewett Troutt — and yet, she admits the adjustment to it all didn't come without its struggle.

The Love Everybody Wants author, 27, had something of a whirlwind courtship, tying the knot with Grant Troutt in Dallas last October 2022 — three months after Grant's proposal just eight months into their relationship.

And while their first year of marriage "has been amazing," Madison is opening up exclusively to PEOPLE about some of the couple's earliest challenges.

"I will say the first three to six months was hard," she acknowledges. "I think that the reason it was hard was something that not a lot of people talk about often I feel like is when you get married, there's this beautiful celebration and union taking place, but there's also this dying to your old life."

She explains, "You're dying to your single life. You're dying to, in a way, kind of your old ways of living and mindset towards certain things. I think that was something that not many people talked about when I entered into marriage."

Related: Madison Prewett Enlisted 'Accountability' Buddies to Hold Her to Purity Pledge Before Marrying Grant Troutt (Exclusive)

Madison says she and Grant "both had to learn the way that we're going to have the healthiest and best marriage is by continuing to lay our life down for one another and serve each other."

"That meant continuing to die to our old life and our old way of living," she continues. "When I was used to being the girl that was, 'Know what you deserve. You tell that man to serve you and pursue you,' which I still stand by and I talk about in my book, but what's interesting in marriage is it
almost a flipped perspective of I can't just wait around for you to serve me and pursue me. I am now called to serve you and pursue you as well."

The former Bachelor contestant adds, "I think that was quite a mindset flip and adjustment that we both had to make. But then once that mindset flipped and we came at it not just looking to get from one another but looking to give and to serve, really, our marriage just became the strongest, the healthiest."

Related: 'Bachelor' Alum Madison Prewett Admits It 'Wasn't Easy' to Wait for Sex Until Marriage — but 'It Was Worth It'

Now, Madison says the duo "are each other's very best friends."

"We just trust each other with all of our heart, and we continue to push each other and make each other better and challenge one another and laugh together," she shares. "I think that's what's so important is there's that two-sided coin where it's like half of the relationship really should be joy and laughter and being each other's best friends. But then the other half really should be pushing each other and making each other better in each other's purpose and closer to each other's faith."

Related: Madison Prewett Recalls Overcoming Being 'Miserable' in Singleness as She Started Writing New Self-Love Book

Navigating romantic relationships is a focal point for The Love Everybody Wants: What You’re Looking For Is Already Yours. The self-love book, which was released on Tuesday, aims to help her readers understand the foundations of love and establish a sense of self-worth.

"I actually started writing this book single, but then over the course of time, ended up dating my now husband," she says. "I really hit every single relationship status from single and miserable to watching all of my friends get married and catching 15 wedding bouquets, to starting to date and evaluate and figure out and navigate is this the person that I want to spend the rest of my life with, and then finish the manuscript two months after being married. It was by the grace of God that I really was able to touch point every single relationship status and really right from an authentic place."

"I know for me, when I was single, one of the hardest things was the people that I was getting advice from or listening to were 30 years older than me and had been married for 50-plus years," she adds. "As much as I loved that and I still read those books and they have helped me through so many seasons, I always longed for someone who I felt like could understand where I was at. That's something that I was super passionate about when I started writing this message."

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The Love Everybody Wants: What You’re Looking For Is Already Yours is available to purchase wherever books are sold.

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