How did you know your partner was the one?

[GentleOliveFatball]

I'm just asking out of curiosity and because I love happy stories like this... If you're in love with your partner and have been together for many years, when did you realise that they were the one for you? How long have you been together? What do you love most about them?

Together 23yrs, married 14.
Met at a bar through mutual friends. Very turbulent 1st year and lots of bickering. I just seemed to know he was the one, but he wasn't sure.

We were on a weekend away, the car broke down and we were caught in a massive rain storm. We huddled under a shrub till we could run to a nearby shop. I just recall thinking at the moment, that I'll remember this moment for a very long time and how special it was.

When I met his family, his sister had just had the 1st baby for the family. Now DH was so caring in the way he held the baby and in amazement said 'she has fingernails!' We had no friends with babies, so I think he thought they didn't come out fully formed. In that moment, I knew he would have made a great dad. Unfortunately, we TTC for 12yrs and have no living children, but we are still very much in love and have a very happy life.

I didn’t, but I’ve never wanted to LTB so here we are.

edit to add / and he didn’t want to leave me either!

Just knew. Having had difficult relationships before (and a divorce) suddenly everything was just easy and obvious. No game playing.

Together 23 years and married for 15.
He felt like home after 3 months, so I know then, but it took him muuuuuch longer, in fact 5-6 years to trust his feelings enough. But he's adopted and his adoptive mum is a cold judgemental fish so I just think he didn't really recognise love instinctively, he kind of needed to weigh it (so to speak).
Very happy and can't imagine being with anyone else, we've ridden out some tough times together and built a decent life including lucky enough to have two lovely kids.