Is 6-8 months too soon to get engaged if you're mid 30s?

Fair enough but who said it was a bad relationship? It's new and going well! Yes there are risks but there are risks to having no children. Some people will badly regret forgoing children because they waited a mythical amount of time or they felt they should be married.

We got engaged on my 30th after 5 months - he said he didn’t know what else to get me as a special present & as he knew we’d get married anyway we got engaged. We moved in together after 2 weeks too 😁
We celebrating our 25th anniversary this year. I said at the time ‘when you’re older you just know’.

I think it's far too soon at any age but me and DH were together for 17 years before we got married.

I think it’s too soon. It’s still dopermine stage! I would be put off if anyone mentioned marriage to me before 2 years, no matter what age I was.

It doesn't matter when you get engaged. How long will you know each other by the time you get married?

I agree! Plenty long enough to know if it's going somewhere. You won't learn very much new after the first year that would change your decision - obviously nasty surprises can crop up at any time.

I would prefer no children to having them when unmarried or in a bad relationship.

We married a year after our first date and we're engaged within three months. Met in my mid 30s and it just felt right. There is no correct timescale.

Why does it feel like it is too soon? Are there things that are worrying you?

I got married 6 weeks after meeting DH. I'm not very wild but I just knew I was going to marry him. He is still so perfect for me. Just trust your gut.

I got engaged after 10 months when I was 28 and married 10 months after that. Would have done both quicker. This was 16 years ago.

I met DH when 24, got engaged after 6 months and weren't even living together yet. We got married 18 months later, it was our 15th wedding anniversary last year.

I don't think there's any right or wrong way to do things. I knew he was the one, nearly 17 years later I still feel the same as does he. We have 2 DC, own our own home. None of my family were concerned in the slightest and all felt we were making the right decision.

Personally I think that's a little soon but everyone is different. I have friends who were engaged and married within the year, but my wife and I took 3 years. We met when I was 28 and she was 31. We got engaged after 2 years and married after 3. Our priority was buying a house together before this and luckily, we were able to save enough to buy a place together after 1.5 years and got engaged shortly after that.

I'd want to live with someone for at least a year before we decided if we were going to get married, regardless of age, personally. You learn a lot by living with someone.

Obviously there are plenty of times where it works out fine, but there are plenty that don't - a third of marriages end in divorce, so reasonably high odds it won't work out.

You can't 100% know whether you'll last as a couple forever regardless of if you got married 2 weeks or 10 years in - but there ARE some things you can learn before to help you know if you're at least capable of getting through the basics together. How someone behaves when they're ill, you're ill, how they handle when something goes wrong in your home or big life stuff happens or you have a blazing row and still have to live together, how you coexist in a shared space, what they're REALLY like about sharing domestic stuff, how they handle (semi-)shared finances that come with living together (and any disagreements), how they are during a period of real stress (or they are with you when you're really stressed). DH and I got married after a very long time together but by that point we'd been through numerous family deaths, car accidents, serious illnesses, a house flooding, plenty of arguments, all sorts - now hopefully the average person doesn't have all of these things happen, but it meant that I felt as sure as it's possible to be (which is to say you can never been 100%, but as close as!) that I felt happy to tie myself to him financially and legally.

If you want children, these things are even more important, I think. How can you possibly know he's going to be someone who'll have your back if you have horrendous PND or birth injuries or an ill child (god forbid all of those things happened of course) - or even just the trenches of babyrearing - if you don't even know how he handles a period of stress otherwise??

Maybe I'm overly cautious but I wouldn't be agreeing to marry someone I didn't know these things about and I can't see how you'd know these things in that short a time period.

Wait until a crisis/proper challenging situation and see how you handle conflict.

We got engaged 2 weeks after we got together - married a few months later - been together now 25 years. Waited a few years to have kids though - getting married is easy to undo - until you have kids - they are the real commitment.

How silly. Anyone who has lived in the world or even read the Mn Relationships forum knows this isn’t true.

Better to have no child than have a child in a bad relationship.

'Getting engaged is irrelevant, OP, but having a child with someone you barely know wpuld be deeply unwise, regardless of whether or not you’ve married them.'

Life has many risks. A bigger risk would be to wait a few year to have the child and your fertility has declined.

18 when I met my now husband, engaged within 9 months. If it’s right, you know. We’ve been together 22 years, married 17.

It's fine if you're both in love. You're still in the honeymoon phase but when you know you know.

You really don't need to wait until after you're married to try for a child though. Especially if you don't have the luxury of time on your body clock.

The ‘I just knew and we’re together and happy 30 years on’ people are demonstrating confirmation bias. I bet everyone on here who didn’t commit very young or without much experience could acknowledge at least one situation where ‘they just knew’ on the first date, and at six months or a year or two years, they’ve emerged as a total stranger you don’t much like.

Getting engaged is irrelevant, OP, but having a child with someone you barely know wpuld be deeply unwise, regardless of whether or not you’ve married them.

the answer depends on who the other person is. If you’ve met ‘’the one’’, then you can get engaged after the first date. If you met ‘the wrong one’, you may not learn their true character for a couple of years. 😉

The problem is that you won’t know if he’s the one or not for at least a year or 2, but in your 30s I would expect you to have quite good instincts and a good nose for red flags.

I met my DP on a blind date although we had chatted every day for two weeks before. We went for a walk and a cup of tea- I thought gosh he’s not my usual type but he’s nice, love his voice and he is jolly interesting and easy to talk to. So offered date 2. He talked a lot and asked a lot of questions and we agreed a date following weekend. He says this was the date he fell in love and knew he wanted to marry me. Date 3 was a show and I really fancied him but I wasn’t sure if he was interested. After the date I asked him if he was interested. He said yes. Date 4 was lunch, afternoon date, evening and dinner and kiss - I knew then he was my keeper. We slept together a couple of months later and that was that.

The feeling someone else put it better on another thread, so I’m going to steal their quote / it’s like a oh there you are - I’ve been looking for you and here you are. In my head.

DP has phoned when he said he would, turned up when he said he would, pulls more than his fair share of weight, he is kind, thoughtful, no drama and yet I fancy the pants off him. Always planning the future and stuff to do, reduces my mental load by 50% easily. Never rattles, never gets cross etc he was not playing any sort of game - I really like you, I love you etc

By all means engagement but a long one. At least 2 years mostly living together before wedding or baby I'd say.

We lived together from about 4/5 months and moved into a place we bought together after 18 months and first DC arrived at the 2 year mark. Not married but in terms of making a committment I think your timescale is fine assuming you have spent a lot of time together and feel like you have had important conversations about how you want your future to be and I would suggest living together before actually getting married

If you are having to ask this question, then I would say it’s too soon.