To not understand why he hasn't proposed yet...?

[Tanz825]

Hi,

Me and my partner have been together 5 and a half years now and he still hasn't asked me to marry him. We have been living together for 4 years and have bought our own house together last year and are living there with our 9 month old daughter. There has always been talk of getting married ever since very early in our relationship, not just from myself but from my partner too but he still hasn't asked me to marry him. I'm starting to wonder why and sometime get upset about it because he knows how important it is to me. I wouldnt be so upset but he keeps referring to where we might get married (abroad) but he hasn't asked me yet and it's like pouring salt in a wound. Over Christmas two of my friends have got engaged and they have been together half the time we have which I was so happy for them but at the same time I felt like it was my turn. His family keep asking him why he's waiting and he just says theirs no rush. He is a romantic at heart and I believe he wants it to be perfect he says we can't afford it. I think hes setting his expectations to high, which is lovely but i dont care about those fancy things. He also thinks that once we get engaged I'll want to get married straight away which is not the case. I've told him I don't care about fancy rings or a big wedding all I want is to be married to him and have the same name as him and my daughter and be his wife. I just feel like the longer were together the less he thinks it matters and that he's just taking his time because he knows he can. Iv thought about asking him but he said a while ago that if I ever ask him he'll say no coz that's his job. I know I may sound selfish but it's getting to me and I'm feeling a little resentful which I don't like. Anyone know how I can't stop feeling like this? I generally just push it to the back of my mind but then something comes up about marriage or engagements and I get a hollow feeling in the pit on my stomach and all those feeling come back. I know I shouldn't feel like this and I should just wait till he's ready, which I will, but In the mean time I need to find a way to block these sad feeling. Anyone have and suggestions?

Thanx
Tanya

fortunately such prejudicial views aren't shared by all professionals
what a shallow judgemental bunch of colleagues you have troisgarcons
some folks wil judge race,class.marital status, that's their problem not mine

I don't know. But I think the OP has the right to know where she stands. I was with a guy for 7 years before I met DH. I've always wanted the security of marriage before having children, merging finances etc- it's just something that was important to me. Ex didn't feel the same. He wanted us to move in together to "try it out", and even talked about children. I really didn't want to tried and tested- I felt after all those years he should know, and he obviously didn't. Instead of telling me he didn't want to get married he kept saying "let's talk about it in the summer/ next Cristmas/ in a couple of months" Finally realised there was a good chance he would never be "ready" and I left him, on good terms. I had a very happy year of singledom, he got a new gf after a few months (although he told me there wasn't the same "spark" as there had been with me. He admitted he hated being alone) I later met now DH, we were married 2 1/2 years after meeting.

10 years on, ex is still with his gf, still not married. They have a child and seem happy, as far as I know. I guess it really wasn't his thing, but it was mine, and it was a dealbreaker. I knew I would end up feeling bitter and cheated if it never happened, but I also knew I couldn't force him into it. I'm actually really glad we didn't marry, as DH is far better suited to me, and his gf is probably far more suited to him, if I'm honest!!

It's hard, because there's almost a stigma to wanting to get married for women nowadays- like you must be a saddo, desperate to "bag" your man, old-fashioned etc. But I had to be honest with myself- it mattered to me. I'm glad I realised I had to look at the odds and make a choice, and I definitely made the right one.

Here are the ones I know about:

1. If your partner leaves you after the kids are gone, you will not be entitled to any maintenance , even though your actions may have supported the work of a high earning husbands and you may have sacrificed opportunities in your career to support his. There is no automatic share of the house either.

2. If your partner dies and there is no will, his property will go to his children or his brothers/sisters if you have no . So you could be homeless. If he has made a will, you will pay 40% on anything over a certain amount. So you could have to sell your home.

3. Many corporate pensions don't recognise co habitees.

As women do earn significantly less than men and hence are likely to own less assets, I think you could say that marriage protects women.

The trouble is with a situation like this... the man likes the fact that you are desperate for him to marry you. He doesn't want to give in and do so, because he can use the possibility of The Proposal to keep you in line indefinitely. Every time he wants something, whether that's sex, not to have to do his fair share of the chores, a night out with his mates, whatever, if you don't let him have his way he can sigh and say that actually he'd been thinking about proposing but now you've Spoiled the Moment.

Am totally bewildered by the stigma thing Maybe it depends on particular areas or class or something? Weird. Sort of thing I'd associate with my grandparents....

mummymccar said "He told me 6 months ago that he was planning to propose but i'm still waiting. I've proposed to him countless times and been rejected so I'm keen to know what others think"

Fairly similar to what the OP has said.

Now this makes no sense to me. If Person A says they will propose, that inevitably means they want to marry Person B. Otherwise they wouldn't propose, would they? So how can they "reject" a proposal from Person B?

Either it's about the timing of the actual ceremony - which really shouldn't affect the proposal and acceptance. It's a declaration of intent, in other words an engagement, and there are no rules on the length of time that should elapse. So timing is no reason not to propose or accept a proposal.

Or (sorry) it is because Person A either doesn't want to marry Person B, or hasn't decided yet, despite what s/he says.

I will allow the possibility of wanting the proposal to be at a particular place and time, top of the Eiffel Tower, in a hot air balloon over the Grand Canyon style of thing, but it really isn't worth holding out for this if in the meantime the delay is making the person you love so miserable.

Oh I see allagory, thanks. Yes, it seems pretty much like you are talking about SAHMs or women who go p/t. I earn about 40% more than DP and would hence have a greater share of our mortgage etc. I don't think it would apply to me tho' I can see why it would to others.

well that makes me a v baaad girl
livin over broom
nae husband

This thread has made me so sad. I'm not married to dp and I find it really upsetting to think that teachers, of all people, may be judging my dc's based on this fact. I do everything possible to be the best parent to my children, yet it seems I've overlooked a vital step.

OP-I think only you can judge if he is serious about getting married or if it's just talk. I know plenty of people who have co-habited for many years before being happily married (hopefully you and I will follow this pattern) and I know others who have been married and divorced again within the space of a few years. Where love is concerned there are no hard and fast rules, it's easy for others to say leave if he won't marry you, but in reality, when you love someone you always want to see the best in them. Could you set a long term deadline for the proposal, talk to him about it, and then not mention it again so you're not nagging but have made your point?

In that case Yonder, in your case, it's your partner who needs the protection of marriage. Especially if he puts proportionally more into keeping the home fires burning. What if you died? Would you want him to lose his home as well as you?

It is 2012. If you want to get married, suggest it.

I would tell him that you want to be married before your dc starts nursery and that in actual fact you will be registering her when she is 2ish. Therefoere you have x amount of time by which to be married.
See what he says to this but calmly state that you will need to start planning the wedding within the next 6 months.
If he brushes you off then I think you have your answer.

Percy
I do recall having a thing about where DH should ask me. Now, I look back and think that it really could not be less important but at the time, I agonised for weeks about it.

Just had a long chat with DP who admitted that he has no desire to get married but was going to propose and marry me at some point regardless because he knows it will make me happy and he would do anything to make me happy.

So what do I do now? Force him to marry me because it is what I want or sacrifice something that I hold really important to me?

Ending it isn't an option because I'd rather spend the rest of my life with him and never get married than spend a day apart.

Think I need an early night.

Originally we werent going to marry. Had some daft notion that living together would be like radical, you know. I am now realising that getting married before having children and then staying married is the radical thing.

Just to clarify the legal advantages of marriage vs. cohabitation:

www.advicenow.org.uk/living-together/

In summary:

1. If one unmarried partner dies, the other cohabiting partner will not automatically inherit their partner's assets. Anything inherited through a will (if there is one) is subject to inheritance tax - spousal exemptions do not apply as they would if you are married.
2. Cohabiting partners are not automatically entitled to a share of their unmarried partners's finances after a split and have no legal rights to their partner?s pension after they die.
3. If a cohabiting couple split up, men do not have an automatic right to see their children, and women are not be entitled to any kind of financial support.
4. Cohabitors don?t count as legal ?next of kin?.
5. A cohabitor does not receive state bereavement benefit or a state pension based on a percentage of their National Insurance contributions as a husband or wife would.

There are some things you can do to secure your position, but nothing can replicate the security you achieve from that one "piece of paper".

I'm not saying anyone should get married if it's not for them. But I've seen too many unmarried people heartbroken and financially trashed by the harsh reality of death or separation.

I'll keep adding this info to these threads for as long as it takes in an attempt to ensure people can make an informed choice.

I don't necessarily agree that there is a "stigma" about not being married. I don't care whether other people are married or not. The only reason it mattered to me was because I felt like my ex wasn't "sure" enough about me to make that comittment. Some women don't care about marriage, but he knew I did, and he knew that it made me feel "not good enough" that he didn't want to make it official and say "forever". It wasn't good for my self-esteem, or the way I felt in our relationship (hey- if anything he was bloody lucky to have me! ) He was a nice guy, but we had different views on comittment and it would therefore never have worked. It took guts to finally call it a day, and many of my friends thought I was daft, but after we split I realised I was happier, more confident and really enjoyed that period of singledom, so we obviously weren't right anyway.

mccarr,sleep on it, no hasty decisions.hard as it is you got a definitive answer re how he feels about marriage

Look, he's either keeping his options open (because he likes the idea that he's not actually married to you so can run off if someone he likes more appears on the scene) or he is enjoying the power he has over you ie that you want something very much that he can choose whether to give it or withold it.

I'm a teacher and I've no idea as to the marital status of most of the parents of the kids I teach and it's certainly not a cause for being judgemental because so many of them are from broken homes/blended families/living with nan/in foster care. If the parents were living together but not married I wouldn't have a clue. I only really pay attention to the ones in care so that I remember to refer to 'parents or carers'.

DH spent months saying to me, "If i asked you to marry me, what would you say?" I got so sick of it that i proposed to him. Married 7y now.
For what it's worth, DD1 was born before we married.

Friends of ours got married 2y ago after 15y together and 2DC, so it can happen!

Mummy
You know what I would focus on? The fact that he was willing to go against what he really believed because it would make you happy and he would do anything to make you happy. That is really very important. (to be honest that brought tears to my eyes)

I have been married 15 years this year, and although I loved the wedding and like being married to him, the actual fact that we are married does not have ANY influence on our daily lives, the way I feel about him or our commitment to each other.

Sleep on it, think about the man you have, and how lucky you are. Being married is not the be all and end all, no matter what it seems like at this moment. Have an honest, caring, loving and loyal man is worth much much more than a marriage certificate.

Btw my DH didn't propose for 5 years. He kept meaning to get around to it but is useless at organising things. So I told him that I was keen to start planning the wedding and could we just get on with it? I think he was rather relieved to be out of the responsibility of having to come up with something.

Am about your judgypants colleagues, troisgarcon. Does anyone really think like this these days?

And anyway, how do these teachers know which parents are married and which are not? Almost all of the mums in my dcs class have kept their maiden names. Do your colleagues look out for wedding rings? Weird!