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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to not understand people announcing that they're 'Getting Engaged'.

330 replies

atthewelles · 18/02/2013 13:12

I mean, either you've agreed between you that you want to get married or you haven't. Tellling everyone that you're 'going to get engaged at Christmas' or that 'we're going to Paris to get engaged' doesn't really make sense. Surely its more exciting to wait until you have the ring and then make a general announcement that you 'are engaged' instead of letting everyone know in advance and then expecting them to get excited and ooh and aah when you appear with a diamond flashing on your finger.

I'm not giving out about it, I just don't understand why people want to take the excitement and surprise out of the occasion like this.

OP posts:
SassySask · 18/02/2013 13:15

Yeah..that's a bit odd! Surely announcing you are engaged is so much more satisfying?

WorraLiberty · 18/02/2013 13:16

People like to tell others when they're looking forward to something important and exciting in their life.

I'm not sure what's hard to understand about it?

Bejeena · 18/02/2013 13:19

For me it was impossible I didn't know I was getting engaged until he was in front of me with a ring!

SauvignonBlanche · 18/02/2013 13:20

I've never got that one either.
If one party has asked the other to get married, and they've agreed, then you are engaged - surely? Confused

EllieArroway · 18/02/2013 13:22

Announcing that you're "going to get engaged" is OTT and odd, I think. Surely, you're already engaged the moment you agree to get married? But people have to have their moments, don't they Hmm

Scholes34 · 18/02/2013 13:22

I always look upon an engagement as the announcement that you're planning to get married. I suppose announcing you're going to get engaged is a bit like sending out the Save the Date cards before the official invite to a wedding.

LilyBolero · 18/02/2013 13:22

it's a bit like announcing you're going to try for a baby, which I've also heard people do.

EllieArroway · 18/02/2013 13:23

Xposted with Sauvignon. Yes, quite.

BookWormery · 18/02/2013 13:25

YANBU. It's ridiculous

Narked · 18/02/2013 13:26

So they're effectively posting to say eg 'My DP's going to ask me to marry him at Christmas'. It is odd but I can't say it bothers me.

fluffyraggies · 18/02/2013 13:31

Yes, it is a bit like telling everyone you have decided that you are going to decide to do something!

You've already decided FGS Grin

BerthaKitt · 18/02/2013 13:34

I've heard of this and it doesn't make sense. If you know you're going to get engaged, then you already are engaged!

lesserspottedshitehawk · 18/02/2013 13:37

Well ta very much atthewellies.

I hadn't given it a second thought till you started this thread.

Then momentarily I didn't understand either.

Then I read Worras post and now I do understand.

sooperdooper · 18/02/2013 13:38

I agree, it's utterly ridiculous, if you've decided to get married you are engaged already!

A girl I worked with once said to me that over the weekend she'd been to pick her engagement ring, so I appropiately said, 'congratulations! can I see it?' and she replied that she was waiting for him to propose properly Confused

How the fook do you end up shopping for an engagement ring if you haven't agreed to get married??? Hmm

RobinSparkles · 18/02/2013 13:39

"I've never got that one either.
If one party has asked the other to get married, and they've agreed, then you are engaged - surely?"

This exactly!
YANBU, OP.

Birdsgottafly · 18/02/2013 13:40

"Surely, you're already engaged the moment you agree to get married"

My DD and her partner are going to get married, eventually and before they start to ttc.

Everyone of their friends who have already had children, or have started to live together or he's cheated, class themselves as "engaged", but are not planning a wedding, which i think is pointless.

They are going to formally become engaged, when they look to book a date and get a ring, so it will be a set time.

I think that in a way it is the proper way of doing it, in a equal society, as the father doesn't need to be asked before the woman and she doesn't have to wait to be asked, like he is doing her a favour.

Original poster
atthewelles · 18/02/2013 13:42

Actually that's another thing I don't really get. People who get engaged but seem to have no actual plans to get married and are still engaged 5 years later. I always thought an engagement was a statement that you have now decided to get married.

OP posts:
stealthsquiggle · 18/02/2013 13:44

"If one party has asked the other to get married, and they've agreed, then you are engaged"

^^ that - YES

It's a binary thing - one party asks, the other says yes, they are engaged. Until then they are not, co-habiting or otherwise. No "planning" involved. It has always bugged me.

RobinSparkles · 18/02/2013 13:45

Yeah, but being engaged is just a promise to each other that you'll be married at some point. There's no time limit on it!

sooperdooper · 18/02/2013 13:45

I don't think a woman has to wait to be asked these days Birdsgottafly I know plenty of people who have just made a joint decision to get married, without the father/parents beign asked or it being just the man who does the asking

JacqueslePeacock · 18/02/2013 13:46

I have never heard of people announcing that they are going to get engaged! Only that they already are engaged.

sooperdooper · 18/02/2013 13:46

You also don't need a ring to be engaged, it's an agreement to get married, not an agreement to wear/buy jewellery

akaemmafrost · 18/02/2013 13:47

Oh it's just wringing every last drop of triumph out of the victory of being a finalist in The Race To Catch A Man isn't it?

smellysocksandchickenpox · 18/02/2013 13:51

YANBU

"we're planning to get engaged at NYE/on holiday in thailand/at X's wedding Confused"
"oh you're engaged, congratulations"
"no, we're GOING to get engaged"
"no! you're WRONG! you are engaged"
(not actual conversation but close enough)

equally as annoying as:
"we're not going to get married, we don't believe in marriage, we're just going to get engaged"
ARGH! - you're not though, you're not engaged if you don't plan to marry, you just have a nice ring!

EllieArroway · 18/02/2013 13:51

Birds Your daughter is already engaged as they are planning to marry each other at some point - which is, in fact, all that really means.