Something potentially strange about PIL engagement.

[Talksense]

PIL are in their 70s and had DP in the mid 1980s. FIL was married before meeting MIL but divorced as his then wife didn’t want kids.

PIL went to see the doctor as they had been trying for a baby for 12 months without any luck before conceiving DP a few months later. Apparently as they were getting older they wanted to focus on having a baby over a wedding. MIL was giving me unwanted advice on how to conceive when all this came out. I didn’t think much of it apart from MIL trying to pry if we were trying to convince/plans to start a family. DP believes the story to be nonsense and that she’s just trying to hide that FIL only proposed as she was pregnant/DP wasn’t an accident.

Im not sure, surely PIL living together, not even engaged must have been somewhat out of the ordinary. I couldn’t give two hoots if they had a shotgun wedding but actually quite curious on societal norms at the time. PIL are definitely not the hippy types and from two very traditional working class families/communities.

In the 80s??? Loads of my friends’ parents were unmarried. I was born in 89.

Maybe fil never actually got divorced?

Fuking hell it was the 80s not the dark ages...

Depending on where they were living it was perfectly normal to have unmarried parents.

I was born in 80s and most of my friends had unmarried parents.

My kids were born in the1980's - many of my friends with kids weren't married, - not remotely unusual. Are you confusing the 1980's with the 1880s ? I see nothing suspicious in what your MIL said, maybe your DP should keep his not very nice thoughts about her to himself.

I was born mid-late 80s, my parents lived together before that but got married after i was born. Really not unusual

We lived together unmarried in the 1960's and it was not at all unusual even then. Commonplace in the 70s and 80s.

“Potentially strange” 🫠

How bizarre. Do you know nothing about history? You’re talking less than 40 years ago

We suspect my dad parents fudged the date of their wedding to accomodate their first born but we has born in 1923.

There was less stigma in the 80s but definitely still some. I got married in 1992 and people still talked of "living in sin" at that time.

It’s the mid -80s! Absolutely everyone lived together then. It was completely normal. I was a young woman then. Marriage was seen as rather old-fashioned and parochial. Babies born to unmarried parents were really common. I wasn’t married when I had my DC.

My parents had my older sister out of wedlock in the 1974. They didn't get married until a few years later. I don't think it was that uncommon.

I was born 1980, my sister in 1977. Our parents were not married. In fact, they’re still together now and are still not married. I don’t think it’s that unusual at all.

I think maybe it was common place earlier in some circles but not in traditionally working class communities. At least 3 of my peers "had to" get married very young (two of them still married to the same man)

Throughout history, people have lived together and had children outside marriage much more than we think. My own aunt and uncle, roughly similar ages to yours, had very similar circumstances. I only realised when I grew up and did the sums on my cousin's age and their wedding anniversary.

I've been happily "cohabiting" since the late 1970s with very little judgement. Not sure what you want to hear. But happy to talk if I can be helpful.

very common, in fact normal, for a widow or divorcee not to marry the next partner. I have two aunts, both widowed in the 70s, both with their current partner since the 80s, one still unmarried, one married last year on their 40th anniversary. Both have children outside of marriage

FH and I both born 1969, neither of our families would have been comfortable with us living together before we married age 23. Early 90s.

So some people would still have felt obliged to marry or hide that they were unmarried.
In my area, not many parents were divorced.

I can’t think of a single school friend whose parents were not married when they were born. A few with divorced parents but they were all married at some point.

Born early 80s.

I can remember my Aunts and Uncles living with partners before marrying but I think at least engaged. My Gran was not happy.

The uncle I mentioned above had two children outside of marriages with different women, but my parents made it very clear that I'd be disowned if I got pregnant without a wedding ring. Attitudes - and resistance to them - vary considerably even within communities and families.

Now I’m feeling bit of a prat.

I guess I’ve been more wondering when societal norms changed. My grandparents are in their late 80s and talk of homes for unwed mothers/premature babies being born looking full term and yet PIL are only 15 years younger.

I was born in 1980 and the only school friend I know whose parents WEREN’T married were the hippy ones who bought carob instead of chocolate.

I’d say it was very uncommon for ordinary wc people at that time.

Aw no, don't feel silly. I would say that there's a long history of these things happening but it not being mentioned. It wasn't unknown for pregnant lasses to be sent away for the duration, or have a shotgun wedding and some fibbing about dates. Lots of families have secrets.

I'm late 40s about as far away from hippy as you can imagine unless you look in my wardrobe and see my real clothing I put on jeans and joggers as a kind of costume for the school run and I have my "work clothes" but my real clothes are way different you might look at my living room and think mmm fairly normal then look up and see bells and evil eye charms hanging around 😂

My memories of the 80s were that although marriage was more common than it was now, living together was certainly not unheard of, though most people I knew got married if they were expecting a baby, or soon after.

For context I was born in the 60s and grew up in London. My parents were Irish and I went to Catholic schools so there was a kind of cultural expectation in that community to at least get married once kids came on the scene. But no it wasn't unusual even taking that into consideration.

Don't feel a prat! Change was really rapid back then.

In the mid 70s - forced adoptions were still happening, single women needed their father's permission to open a bank account in their own name or take out a bank loan or a credit card. By the 1980s, all change!