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Original poster

if you're happily married, did you 'Know' from the first date?

101 replies

MyHandHeldHoover · 29/12/2018 13:59

I'm 32 and finding dating really hard. I've met some lovely men and maybe given it three months but nothing's ever stuck.

Am I better being totally ruthless and saying one date only? It sounds stupid but fuck me, these holidays have been hard. I'm the only single one out of all my friends, and they'll are getting engaged and married and pregnant.

OP posts:
LastOneDancing · 29/12/2018 15:10

I can remember thinking someone was 'the one' after our first date. He DEFINITELY wasn't.

With DH we took it all extremely slowly and broke up for a while after 2 years. I can remember liking him a lot on our first date & knowing he was different in a good way, than any other man I'd met, but I didn't 'know'.
Been together 13y now, with 2DC.

Mablethorpe · 29/12/2018 15:12

Not from the first date but probably about three or four dates in I knew. He asked me to marry him after six weeks and I agreed. We got married 18 months later and have been together 18 years with two lovely DCs.

Don't give up, the right one is out there!

jackio2205 · 29/12/2018 15:13

I feel like our generation are slightly different, eeeeeeverything is faster now and instant, so I do think maybe you should take a bit of inspiration from that, in that if you're not really feeling it then why bother continuing, however if there is a little something there then u gotta work at it a bit. My advice would be to really sit down and think about what would work for you so you can whittle out unsuitable blokes from the go, ones that need not apply (haha!) x

Escolar · 29/12/2018 15:17

It's tricky OP. I'm happily married after 21 years together and I didn't 'know' after one date or indeed three months. But I do understand you not wanting to waste time on the wrong man.

coffeeagogo · 29/12/2018 15:23

I knew the night I met him and told my mum the next day I'd met the man I was going to marry - we didn't rush into marriage but 17 years later we are happy - he's my best friend and favourite person to be with

whystay · 29/12/2018 15:25

Yes I knew the first time I met him that I wanted to settle down with him. We were 32 when we met. I'd had a few boyfriends previously, the last one had lasted a few years and it was only when I broke up with him that I realised it hadn't been a great relationship.

When I met my now DH, I thought he was really nice and kind, not the sort of person to have any dramas etc, just what I needed. And we're now happily married.

Afonavon · 29/12/2018 15:26

Christ, no. In fact we just weren’t relaxed enough in each other’s company for the first month, and broke up every other time we met up. Luckily we persevered and years later are still together.

Original poster
MyHandHeldHoover · 29/12/2018 15:27

My usual yardstick is 'would I feel comfortable with you in my house?'. I don't know if that's stupid or not.

I know another poster commented on trust developing over time, but I just feel increasingly panicky that I am getting older. The holidays make everything worse too.

OP posts:
StillIRise87 · 29/12/2018 15:32

Yes, from the second time we met I knew and we were talking about marriage within the first week of our relationship! Been together eight years with one child.

BlueBrush · 29/12/2018 15:36

First date I knew he was exactly the sort of person I was looking for, but I didn't "feel" it romantically (because there was another man I'd already met who was a bit of a distraction), but I knew it was worth sticking with, and a month later it all just clicked into place, and I fell head over heels in love, and knew with certainty we'd get married. So it took a while to fall in love, but I knew from the first date he was different. First serious boyfriend, I was 29. Stick with it!

mountainlakes · 29/12/2018 15:38

My checklist was:
Educated to the same level as me.
Ambitious
Generous. I needed to know if I was the sahp he'd support me with no questions on what I spent the money on.
Loyal to family as family is really important to me.
Same political views.
Kind
Respectful
Independent

Our first few dates were really a relationship interview. My first serious boyfriend was violent, emotionally and sexually abusive. He tried to kill me once. So I was very nervous and guarded my heart from it happening again. Anyway dh passed the interview and we have been together 22 years! But I wasn't into time wasters. I have trust issues so wouldn't waste my time on a fling.

umpteennamechanges · 29/12/2018 15:38

I knew I liked him a lot from the first date but...

I have two friends who are now totally loved up who weren't that sure about their other halves for a few weeks/months.

One of them was dating two guys, I remember having a whole discussion about which one she should go for and she decided Bloke A. Changed her mind at the last minute and went for Bloke B which has turned out to be her DH. So very close to ditching him for the other guy and who knows if that one would've worked out (statistically almost certainly not!)

FourFuxxakes · 29/12/2018 15:39

No. There was no expectation or anything. We just took each date, each short weekend away and each month together just as it came and had fun along the way. We gradually got closer and more comfortable together as we got to know each other and took the relationship forward in baby steps because there was no rush. It's been 10 years now, nearly 11, and we're married with 2 kids.

umpteennamechanges · 29/12/2018 15:42

I also met someone I thought was 'the one' quite early on, huge chemistry for both of us but turned out to also be a huge knobhead so 🤷🏻‍♀️

Original poster
MyHandHeldHoover · 29/12/2018 15:42

My initial first date checklist is

  • works full time
  • does not live at home
  • types well and uses coherent sentences
  • seems vaguely interesting

My on dates checklist is

  • is punctual
  • is polite to all staff
  • no flashy gestures
  • we can chat without much awkwardness

I'm not daft, I'm not looking for a horse and carriage and fireworks.

OP posts:
IAmAlwaysLikeThis · 29/12/2018 15:46

I think what clinched it for me was when he said he thought of marriage as being a team where you are both working not just for yourselves but for each other.

I knew then that I could actually live with him.

He’s never let me down on that either, he always considers me as well as himself. All of our goals etc are shared.

irisheyesaresmiling7 · 29/12/2018 15:50

The night I met my now DH I wasn't even supposed to be going out! I was only 18 but was sick of the sight of all men.. yet the night I met him I knew he was different, not sure why but he just was.
He was 18 too but was very mature, much more mature than the older men I'd been out with and he treated me with a lot of respect. There was never any game playing, if he said he would do something/be somewhere, etc he did (and me too).
I'd say from our 3rd date we both 'just knew' and we got engaged just over 2 months after we met!
23 years later (20 of those married) with 5 DC he is still my best friend & soulmate and I his. We have had ups and downs like everyone else including bereavements, extended family problems, losing our family home in the recession but we always turn to each other and he's the only person I truly trust! I suppose you could say we just grew up together.

ChodeofChodeHall · 29/12/2018 15:51

No, I couldn't stand him at first! He grew on me very gradually.

irnbruforlife · 29/12/2018 16:11

Knew from the minute i laid eyes on him. He moved in unofficially 2 weeks later (he pretty much stayed one night and never went home 😂). 15 years later and we are as happy as ever. Sometimes you just know. Obviously on mn I'm the devil incarnate because I was a single parent. Dh adopted dc after 4 years. We have had the odd major fight, may be 4 in 15 years which have never lasted more than 24 hours. But Yh, it literally is the most wonderful thing to meet someone and just know instantly.

CuppaSarah · 29/12/2018 16:13

I knew the first time I laid eyes on him. It's been 11 years now. To be honest I think that bit was more luck than judgement, we were both 18 and still finding out who we were. We always said since we had so much growing up to do, we may grow apart and that's ok. But we grew stronger. There's been ups and downs of course, but we're very lucky. We both just knew there was something special about us, even in the lower points early in our relationship, we both wanted to make it work.

OhTheRoses · 29/12/2018 16:22

We both knew as we laid eyes on each other. It was instantaneous and there was a connection. I was there with someone else as was he. We couldn't keep our eyes off each other. We danced. We laughed. He touched me as we danced (nicely!).

He broke up with his girlfriend within the next two weeks. We bumped into each other at the station when he was with her and I knew she knew and she knew that I knew.

He looked up my employer in the phone book and rang and asked me to dinner. It was divine but I was going to the states within 48 hours. I phoned him from the US; when I got back we went to the theatre and then for dinner. We have barely spent a night apart since that second date. We have been together for nearly 30 years.

Still love him as much.

SpaceCadet4000 · 29/12/2018 16:25

I knew from the first date that it was different to other dates- we just clicked way more than I had with anyone and talked for 8 hours straight. After about 8 weeks I knew. We both felt very much the same.

Redgreencoverplant · 29/12/2018 16:26

I didn't on the first date as it wasn't entirely clear whether or not it was a date or not. At the end of the second I remember sitting on my bed after he had dropped me off and thinking 'shit this is it, this is the rest of my life' (the shit was in shock rather than thinking it was a bad thing). If you had told me it was possible to just know before that date I would have laughed at you.

Been together 7.5 years now and married 5 with a DS and still crazy in love :)

Fairylea · 29/12/2018 16:28

We knew from date 1. We met through plenty of fish (!!) and met at a coffee shop expecting to only stay an hour - we’d both really had it with online dating and although we didn’t say this to each other it was kind of our last ditch attempts! I hid behind a bookcase and checked him out before we met properly BlushGrin

We ended up staying until the shop shut and the staff pushed us out! It was great. I found him really easy to talk to and we seemed to have the same goals and interests / views etc. I could see it going the distance. We went for a walk and sat on a bench in the city centre and chatted some more.

We didn’t even kiss for another few weeks... we were both incredibly shy and nervous of getting hurt (I was divorced with a young dd and he was back home with his mum after an awful long term breakup!)

We got engaged 2 years later and he asked me to marry him at the same bench we sat on at our first date Grin

We’ve been together nearly 10 years now and have a son together and he is a wonderful step dad to my teenage dd.

This thread shows you don’t always know; but for us I think we did.

Sexnotgender · 29/12/2018 16:29

Yes I knew he was special on our first date. Been married a year now and expecting our first child. Still get butterflies when I see him.

I met another guy a couple months previously, chatted online and he was fantastic. Knew straight away when I met him it wasn’t going to work. Had a second date out of politeness but I say trust your gut.

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