Please share: Relationships, Engagement and Marriage

[Biciclista]

KSH, please don't take this personally. From what you wrote, you did the right thing ditching that guy. I just want people to understand that a good marriage between two flawed people IS possible.

First off, do not let the fact that everyone around you is getting married, make you feel like YOU should be getting married. There is a lot of unspoken pressure on women to get married. It's like if you are not married... there must be something wrong with you. There isn't. It's OK not to be married.

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I absolutely agree.

the night before MY wedding, I thought; "I am making a big mistake, I shouldn't marry this guy" But I did.
And sometimes it was really tough, but I am glad I went through with it. In the eyes of any sane person who was around me at that time, it was obvious that I had made a mistake. But that's precisely why I am telling you guys about my marriage (see post above) because there's no RULE Not all happy marriages have a 2 year engagement and a church wedding. Not all unhappy marriages started with a drunk groom and a trip to Las Vegas

1) You can't KNOW someone after only a few months or even a year or two. People have a vision of who they are, and it's not always reality. Only over time can you really start to understand who a person is at their core, by watching their behavior over time. This is why I cringe when I see someone just jump into marriage.

You can apply this rule even further. You never really know someone (know how they are going to react in a given situation) so what's the difference between waiting 3 months or 3 years?
Like so many other things in life, marriage is a crapshoot.

2) Marriage is serious. It sounds like fun... you get sucked into the fairy tale... being swept off your feet and into love. But the fairy tale ends and you are stuck with this person day in and day out.

You're absolutely right here. Once the shine is off, you can see the warts and smell their dirty socks. BUT, with TWO people making a commitment, it's worth it.

3) When you are married, there is no way out if that person treats you like crap, unless you are willing to get divorced. I didn't want to get divorced so I had to tolerate him treating me bad. Me asking him to be a good person didn't do it. He didn't care how he treated me and I couldn't change that.

Right. Person #2 didn't make a commitment. That just won't work!

4) Very few people who are married are happy. Some are. But MOST are not. Most are in the marriage for the kids, it's the right thing, etc.

Very few people are happy. I have been unhappy with myself but happy with my marriage. today I am happy about both. It's worth working on and fighting for. My life is so richer having been married, a partnership with a person based on love, respect and compromise...

5) Marriage is all about tolerating someone else. They will change over time. You will have tolerate it. For example, my ex got to where he refused to shower more than twice a week. I asked him to shower, he would not. There was nothing I could do. I had to tolerate it.

Marriage is also about picking your battles. I can get totally freaked out about coffee cups everywhere or I can save my energy for more important stuff.

You're ABSOLUTELY right. If you don't want to waste energy doing this compromise dance, and ha, raising kids, that's even harder than being married. And you don't get the benefit of happily ever after. Your kids are going to grow up and leave you; so PLEASE don't just get married to have kids.

[KSH]

KSH, please don't take this personally. From what you wrote, you did the right thing ditching that guy. I just want people to understand that a good marriage between two flawed people IS possible.



.
I absolutely agree.

the night before MY wedding, I thought; "I am making a big mistake, I shouldn't marry this guy" But I did.
And sometimes it was really tough, but I am glad I went through with it. In the eyes of any sane person who was around me at that time, it was obvious that I had made a mistake. But that's precisely why I am telling you guys about my marriage (see post above) because there's no RULE Not all happy marriages have a 2 year engagement and a church wedding. Not all unhappy marriages started with a drunk groom and a trip to Las Vegas



You can apply this rule even further. You never really know someone (know how they are going to react in a given situation) so what's the difference between waiting 3 months or 3 years?
Like so many other things in life, marriage is a crapshoot.



You're absolutely right here. Once the shine is off, you can see the warts and smell their dirty socks. BUT, with TWO people making a commitment, it's worth it.


Right. Person #2 didn't make a commitment. That just won't work!




Very few people are happy. I have been unhappy with myself but happy with my marriage. today I am happy about both. It's worth working on and fighting for. My life is so richer having been married, a partnership with a person based on love, respect and compromise...




Marriage is also about picking your battles. I can get totally freaked out about coffee cups everywhere or I can save my energy for more important stuff.

You're ABSOLUTELY right. If you don't want to waste energy doing this compromise dance, and ha, raising kids, that's even harder than being married. And you don't get the benefit of happily ever after. Your kids are going to grow up and leave you; so PLEASE don't just get married to have kids.

Great commentary!

BTW- he ditched me. I hung on to the marriage until he said he wanted a divorce. But I certainly didn't fight it when he said he was leaving. I didn't suggest we work on it, I didn't wait around "just in case", I started dating someone 2 weeks later (who I am still with 5 years later).

Let me add this, I now know that I'm not made for marriage. I can be selfish and I want everything my way.

I think my decisions are the wisest most times and if someone doesn't want to go along with a decision of mine that seems to me, to be more intelligent, then I get annoyed and shut down.

Horrible to say, I know, but that is why I can only take people in small doses (aka: not live with them).

Of course it didn't help that I was married to a completely selfish and insecure man who only cared about the world revolving around him. Even though I am selfish, I still think of others and try to do things to make them happy. I did cater to him and take care of him.

With that said, I know never to get married again and I will not be having kids.

[Crankin]

Thank you, Mimi for your apt comments. KSH, you seem like you know yourself well; but I do agree with Mimi in that very few PEOPLE are happy. People look to others to fulfill their dreams and that isn't going to happen. Most people go into marriage only caring about their dream wedding that they spend zillions on and never give a thought to what comes afterwards. I don't care if you are 19 or 39, but this seems to be the way it is.
I was married to a jerk before I met my husband. I knew the whole time it was wrong, but I still went ahead and did it, because I didn't want to be alone at the age of 22! Most people don't even know that I was married before and my own kids were shocked when they found out.
Everything I did the second time would have predicted disaster (moving in together after a month and getting married after six months) but we are even happier now, after 29 years. We've really never had any rough times, a few bad fights, but mostly we just talk about everything. And, I'm a pretty selfish person, too. But, I've become more caring because my husband proved to me that he was going to stick around no matter what.

Most people around where I live get married between the ages of 35-50. There's lots of first time moms who are in their forties. This presents a whole other bunch of issues; personally, I am glad I didn't wait. I had a job, a graduate degree, and felt like an adult at 26. I wasn't sure if I wanted kids, but when my husband was very close to getting himself "fixed," I suddenly became obsessed with having one. So, I knew that I really did want kids!
Like I said before, while you have to take care of yourself, the marital bond should come before any other relationships. For years my in laws went nuts because they thought I turned my husband into a "snob" because he finished his degree, got a good professional job, and moved back east. In a lot of cases, a husband (or wife) doesn't stand up to his or her parents over stuff like that. There never was a question here. When they learned they couldn't bully us or buy our affection, it calmed down, but never really went away.