Please share: Relationships, Engagement and Marriage

[Ana]

I am reaching the age at which point many of my peers are engaged and married. I am in a transitional period of my life and can barely fathom marriage in my future (or near future, anyway).

I would love to read about some of your life experiences related to engagement, marriage, and relationships in general. I know that we're all human and therefore imperfect but I am having difficulty understanding other people's relationships. The media idealizes romance and depicts often inaccurate portrayals of life (i.e. happily ever after...) but I like to keep it real so I'd very much like to hear some happy and sad stories about love from some of you!

How do you know you're ready to be married? What are some of the obstacles that strengthened or destroyed your relationship?

If you'd rather PM me, that would be great, too!

I know this is a lot to ask so I would like to express my gratitude in advance.

[Veronica]

I first met my husband when I was in 6th grade. We became good friends when I was a freshman in high school and he was a sophomore. We started dating the next year. We got married when I was 19 and most of our 22 and a half years have been very happy.

He is incredibly supportive of me and is truly my best friend. For us it really has been happily ever after. We think a lot of that is because we didn't have children and all the stresses that raising children can bring. Neither one of us really wanted to have kids - so we didn't. Raising children is too important of a job to do half a$$ed. It's a lot of work to do right.

I think he is a better husband than I am a wife.

Veronica

[Biciclista]

I would love to contribute here. I briefly met my husband in 1972 when a guy i dated once (his brother) introduced me to his little brother. I saw him occasionally for the next 5 years. We weren't friends, but if we passed each other on the street, we'd say hi.
In December of 1977, we met again, fell in love, and in March , 1978; we got married. 8 months later, my first son was born. When I married my husband, he was unemployed. We were absolutely clueless. If anyone had cared enough they would have told us to WAIT. actually, someone did.

We're still married and have one of the best marriages I know of. yes, that's right, more than 30 years.

to what do i attribute our success? We made a commitment to stay together. Doesn't matter if i can't stand him today; I know tomorrow, I'll get over what I'm mad about and he'll still be there to love me. And vice versa. It works.

[Kimmyt]

I am currently engaged. I never ever thought that I would be someone who was engaged to be married. I just didn't see it. Honestly? i don't know if we'll make it. I hope to whatever deity that we do, because it scares me shitless that we might not. But the thing is, we don't know. All we can do is try our best to make it work out for the rest of our lives.

I don't know what specifically you're looking for, but if you have any more specific questions you can ask me. Also, I would recommend checking out a forum I frequent which gives some very interesting insight into the lives of people in all stages of relationships, www.indiebride.com. There are lots of very interesting threads on there about all sorts of things.

[badger]

I'm in a long-distance relationship; I'm in Vancouver, he's in Cornwall, England. We met online 5 years ago, and we've gone back and forth to each other's country and I've started the process of sponsoring him. To us, that's as good as getting enganged.

We don't have any plans on getting married, but we have no plans on not being together for as long as possible, either. People often wonder how we keep it up, but it works for us, and there is a very strong love bond between us that I've never felt with anyone.

It hasn't always been rosy, the first 3 years were actually quite tough, but it's a very supportive relationship and I would be in a much worse place without him when Chevy (my dog) died.

You're probably feeling the way you do because you haven't met the right person. Sounds terribly cliche, and I never believed it, either, til it happened to me. Don't feel pressured to be in a relationship or be married or whatever. If you happen to be happy and single, that's great! but don't feel like you need a boyfriend/husband, because there's nothing worse than being in a relationship with someone who's not right for you.

[Irulan]

I would love to read about some of your life experiences related to engagement, marriage, and relationships in general. I know that we're all human and therefore imperfect but I am having difficulty understanding other people's relationships. The media idealizes romance and depicts often inaccurate portrayals of life (i.e. happily ever after...) but I like to keep it real so I'd very much like to hear some happy and sad stories about love from some of you!

How do you know you're ready to be married? What are some of the obstacles that strengthened or destroyed your relationship?

Don't choose a partner thinking that they will change later, or that you can change them, or that if they love you they WILL change. Or, don't ignore something that has the potential to flare up into something big. An example might be... you guys like to party on the weekends? What happens when one of you decides to quit boozing it up and settle down, and the other wants to keep going. This is all hypothetical of course. Love does not conquer all.

Don't deny the realities of who/what you/they are. We all have baggage. What is it, and how does it affect your relationships?

Women especially expect men to be mindreaders, which is very destructive to relationships.

It's important to have discussions ahead of time on money values, childrearing values, religion in the home, etc.

I've got 29 years under my belt, and we've been through it all, including two kids and a trip to marriage hell that we had to fix. So there's all my advice.

[Ana]

Don't feel pressured to be in a relationship or be married or whatever. If you happen to be happy and single, that's great! but don't feel like you need a boyfriend/husband, because there's nothing worse than being in a relationship with someone who's not right for you.

I completely agree. I am a strong, independent woman and view relationships as something that should enhance and enrich my life. I also very much enjoy doing my own thing My curiosity about others' relationships mostly originated from my contemplative state.

Thank you for sharing!

Keep it coming

[Grog]

to what do i attribute our success? We made a commitment to stay together. Doesn't matter if i can't stand him today; I know tomorrow, I'll get over what I'm mad about and he'll still be there to love me. And vice versa. It works.

Oh, so true.

[Trekhawk]

to what do i attribute our success? We made a commitment to stay together. Doesn't matter if i can't stand him today; I know tomorrow, I'll get over what I'm mad about and he'll still be there to love me. And vice versa. It works.

Mimi you have hit the nail on the head with that statement.

I was 31 when we got married and we have been married now for 13 years.
We have three great boys and I feel very blessed to have such a wonderful family.
We do annoy each other sometimes but we also make each other laugh and that is gold.

[salsabike]

I got married when I was 37 (1991) and I still think he's the coolest guy I know. I almost got married when I was 23 and again in my late 20s, and had I married either of them, I would be divorced now. I got very lucky. We laugh a lot. We don't have control battles. We love to do some things together, and other things separately. He's smart, funny, interesting, cool, calm and collected, and committed.

Take your time. No need to rush. Speak up about important things when you need to, but pick your battles--not everything is important enough to fuss about. See past the "does he give me cool presents on my birthday" to "does he act lovingly". Be careful around needy people---they're pretty exhausting in a marriage. Don't marry anyone who doesn't make you laugh reasonably often. Don't marry someone who is unkind. Get comfortable with apologizing and acknowledging your own weirdnesses.

[alpinerabbit]

I think you need to be best friends with your partner.

I also think a relationship cannot work out between people who do not have a basic respect for other humans, and who put their "wants" first. Dunno how else to express it.

I've lived with my DBF for the past 10 years, together 11.5 yrs.
We would probably be married if there wasn't the tax hike you suffer when you do, as we both make a full salary. I don't want kids, although sometimes I fear I will regret it, but then the "minuses" come back into focus.
We've talked it through, I think he could envision them but I do not think he would cut back on his career so it would be me bearing most of the load.

We have never had a fight. He supported me through some rough times.
Once I was whining about the job when the previous one was the job from hell (&above-said rough times) that I just got out of, and he got exasperated, probably thinking "there she goes again" - I realized what I was doing and told him that I did not expect him to solve my problems, just to listen and pat my head saying "I understand".

I need to have a partner that I can look up to, in part at least, intellectually. That does not necessarily mean he has to be better educated, but he has to at least be mentally agile.

The physical part of a relationship, I think, gets overrated and after 10 years, we are in a comfortable, low key kinda rhythm that suits me. Physical closeness is much more important.
We've talked about that as well. He's not good with expressing emotions but I told him repeatedly that he must bring it up if something's not right. Hope he will.
He is the loveliest person I know as a type of guy, he loves cooking, etc.
I think you need to keep up gestures of love to keep the fire crackling. So I try to sneak in little things, sticky notes when I'm gone unexpectedly, etc., go out and have a drink before dinner -
And his body is looking better than ever with starting triathlons as well :-P

[Brandi]

to what do i attribute our success? We made a commitment to stay together. Doesn't matter if i can't stand him today; I know tomorrow, I'll get over what I'm mad about and he'll still be there to love me. And vice versa. It works.

I third that! My mom has been married 4 times! She runs away when trouble starts. That is not what you do. How can the other person depend on you and trust that you will be there when times are tough if you run away.
I met my dh when I was 19 and he was 29. I came from a seoiusly broken family and had a lot to learn about relationships. I am still learning going on 22 years now with dh. He is my best friend period. He pushes me when I am lazy and he supports alomost everything I do. He always has an opinion and thinks he is right. But I know he is not always right even when he doesn't. I can't imagine my life without him. And to be honest if goes before me I don't think I would get involved again. He is my complete relationship. I have come a long way since we first met and so has he. We are still very close and we often comment on how even after all this time we still find eachother very attractive. He rocks!

[Brandi]

Oh by the way we were together 7 years and bought a house together before we got married. And we work together 24-7. Talk about having to be patient with eachother!

[xeney]

My husband and I met when he was almost 22 and I was almost 25. I was engaged to somebody else and he had previously dated my niece (she introduced us). The attraction was about 95 percent physical and it was a totally doomed relationship: we actually hooked up in a bar.

We moved in together less than a year later to save money even though neither of us saw long-term prospects: doomed! We bought a house we could not quite afford when I was 28 and he was 25: doomed! We finally got married in 2004, when I was 35 and he was 32: doomed! Everyone knows that when those perennial live-together couples finally get married, they always break up within a year! And then we had a baby in 2007. Doomed, doomed, doomed!

It will be 15 years in May. I'd still hook up with him if I happened to bump into him in a bar again.

[Geonz]

I'm 48 and single/

I keep forgetting to be unhappy. I am loved and I love well, and deeply; just not domestically, or something like that. I am, in some ways, freer to share and give because I don't have the responsibilities that come with family.

Whatever you do, don't let the idea that your peers are "in relationships" make you feel like you have to have one. Just like a vegetarian can have a well-balanced diet without meat, a woman can have a well-balanced life without it, too