First, and please forgive us, but: Must you?
Consider the challenges of a straightforward business partnership. Then consider the challenges of a marriage. Then consider the multiplied difficulties when combining them.
This sounds to you like a plan?
Though there are no accurate statistics about what happens when spouses try to run a business together, expert estimates are grim: "Only 5% of couples can make all-in partnership work," says Azriela Jaffe, a frequent reporter on the phenomenon of entrepreneurial couples and author of Permission to Prosper: What Working Wives Crave From Their Husbands, and How to Get It. ("All-in" co-ownership is tougher than a partnership in which one spouse is a subordinate who's helping out.)
Still, we know you'll try it anyway. And there is, potentially, an upside, says Kathy Marshack, a widely known business coach and psychologist who specializes in working with entrepreneurial couples (and who has written Entrepreneurial Couples: Making It Work at Work and at Home). "There's potential for tremendous personal growth," she says. "When you're confronted constantly by someone who knows you so well, you're going to have an extraordinary opportunity to work on your flaws and develop as a person."