AIBU to be disappointed not to have an engagement ring?

[finlaythecat]

My partner popped the question on Christmas eve and we are over the moon. He made a homemade ring for the occasion which I love and which will always be 'The Ring' but is not suitable to actually wear.

We went ring shopping together in early January and he had no idea about cost of rings so it was all quite a suprise to him! I would like a platinum ring so I can wear it every day and my job is quite hands on. The rings we've looked at have been around £1000-£1500.

We have a good amount of savings and several of the jewellers we went into offer payment in installments etc. However, DP has said he doesnt want to use any of our savings and does not want to buy it on credit. We are not badly off financially and hopefully in May he will be becoming a partner in his business, leading to a big salary increase.

In the mean time we are paying to have several rooms plastered, carpeted etc and our garden cleared.

AIBU to be sad about not having a ring 2 months down the line and that everything else is taking priority financially? I know I sound like a complete spoiled brat and it is a big luxury but I feel like he is not interested at all.

The tradition for only women wearing engagement rings, or engagement rings being a 'thing' at all, is not universal.

My non-British fiancé is just as happy with his ring as I am with mine. His will be his wedding ring as well, while I have a matching wedding band waiting for when we get married, and I have an extra engagement ring with stones, to sort of merge our two cultures together (people here seem to either wear the plain wedding bands on their left hand, then move them to the right hand upon marrying, or just don't have rings at all until they get married).

Thinking about it, I would have felt odd being the only one wearing a symbol of our engagement. But I just thought I'd point out that UK engagement/wedding ring traditions are not a universal standard.

Incidentally we bought my engagement ring from a second hand jewellery shop, it's white gold with six diamonds arranged in a sort of slanted half-eternity style setup (looks a little bit like a braid) and only cost £75. And I love it.

Oh OP, I feel for you. Yes, it may be old-fashioned, or born from a cold-hearted calculating (but highly effective) marketing campaign or represent some misogynistic rights over women, but despite that, I bloody love my rings.

I have an engagement ring, wedding ring and eternity ring that give me extraordinary amounts of pleasure everytime I see them. Every day they make me smile. Not because of how much they cost, but because of how much I love them and because of how special they make me feel because my husband bought them for me. He saved for them, he/we chose them, and I adore and cherish them. Shallow, perhaps, but this metal and sparklyness genuinely bring me joy every single day.

No engagement ring, no wedding ring either, and registry office equivalent wedding. I did have a new outfit, and he bought a new tie, which we both wore to work for years.

But, 24 good years so far. Perhaps because we share much the same sense of spending priorities.

I would say you guys need to have some serious heart to hearts about priorities. Neither of you are wrong, but being this out of sync about £ is going to be an ongoing problem.

What is an eternity ring?

As for something you can wear everyday, i have a silver ring bought at a stall at a music festival, that I have worn daily, even through my years in culinary school and working as a chef, since before I met dp. Yabu to think you need a platinum ring for this reason.

I'm confused - what is stopping you buying the ring? Is it that you want dp to buy the ring for you? Or that he will not allow the money to come out of mutual finances? If the latter - maybe suggest a plan to cut back on other things to pay for it. I think this boils down to any other financial decision in a relationship - both parties have to be on board.

Price for Palladium (now it's being fixed) www.lme.com/metals/precious-metals/palladium/

$809.50 USD per Troy ounce
32.1507466 troy ounces to the Kg

809.5 x 32.1507466 = $26,029.03 per Kg
A troy oz is just over 30 grammes
Average weight of ring is circa 6 grammes.

There are 1000 grammes per Kg.
A troy oz is just over 31 grammes
Average weight of ring is circa 6 grammes.
The average ring is around 1/5 of a troy oz.

Palladium ring $26,030/0.006 = about £101.50

Titanium is harder than Palladium.
Titanium is currently $5.80 USD per Kg
A Titanium ring would cost $5.80/0.006*0.65 = £0.02

£101.50/£0.02 = 0.0203%

Platinum is only 3.5 on Moh's scale, Palladium is 5, with Titanium being ~9.5
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohs_scale_of_mineral_hardness

Ergo, a jeweller suggesting Platinum for longevity is
a) a crook
b) ill-educated in his craft.

Industrial diamonds are circa $10 USD per carat, circa £6.50

So 5 carats of diamonds + one 6gm ring, would cost about £32.52 in materials. Then you have only the cost of the jeweller to polish your diamonds and create your ring to your own design.

Now, if it's the bling effect you want, you'll just go for the £1500 option and wave it under a few noses.

Congratulations on your engagement.
In general I always buy vintage/ antique jewellry, much better value.
However, I have bought QVC diamonique rings, great value, look authentic. I mix them with the real thing and they are indistinguishable.

BTW an eternity ring, is a diamond band. Usually given after the birth of first child, or after 25 years of marriage. Nowadays diamond set wedding bands seem to be the norm.

An eternity ring is a band or half band of sparkly loveliness.

RatMort I haven't bought into anything, DP has!

As I said, I thought it was a ludicrous idea to spend so much on an item of jewellery, but he wanted to get it for me and insisted that it say "the right things" i.e. that I'm worth the hard work it takes to earn that sort of money. My ex used to criticise me for buying expensive orange juice from Tescos and never bought me flowers as they were a waste of money, so yes, it does mean a lot for someone to think "hang the expense, she's special and deserves something pretty and pointless" once in a while!

So you get an engagement ring when you get engaged, a wedding ring at your wedding and an eternity ring at your.… having a baby?

Another marketing effort by de beers i presume.

I was so glad that my DH proposed with the ring, I would have found it so difficult to choose a ring that I wantd to wear every day for the rest of my life! But I would have been so gutted if I had not liked it, so I can understand why some people go shopping after.

It's a shame that the ring is not a priority for hubby to be, but everyone is different so you need to have an honest discussion about how you feel. I think a compromise would be to buy a cheap tempory one (I think this a waste personally) or to agree to use some of your savings (it's your money too) and to both make it a priority to put a bit away regularly. And you should pick the ring you want now and get the price fixed in both your minds. If he wants a ring or equivalent let him speak up :)

Some of the other sneery posters are so boring...ok so it's a sexist tradition and dreamt up by a jewellers etc..but that's no ones business and you want a ring, it is not unreasonable! He did obviously have getting you a ring in mind (as he proposed with one), so great, that's something you both agree on! He does sound sensible with money which is an asset, it's just that some people need a bit of a nudge to spend to enjoy life rather than spend on sensible things only.

And regarding the resale value of diamonds/platinum...I really don't get the point about that...artificial market? The market price is what people are willing to pay, as for most things surely? Name one thing without a mark up... The resale value of my sofas wouldn't be much but does that mean I shouldn't pay £000s for them if i think it's worth it? It's only fabric after all .

Diamonds may be expensive and marketed cleverly but they are beautiful and you will enjoy your ring everytime you look at it.

And as for people criticising the amount...it's all relative, it's what the couple seem to be happy to spend (just that they are working out exactly how to fund it) so it's not daft....again, mind your own business.

But... you have a ring? He made you one?

Hubb Do you not consider that telling people to 'mind their own business' on a web-forum that canvasses opinions, is rather hypocritical?

You've just written a post, that states your views, then proceeded to say that anybody who disagrees with your viewpoint to mind their own business. Are you the OP's husband to be? If your aren't, then it's none of your business either.

the only thing I would advise you re diamonds OP,is to research into getting conflict free diamonds. A lot of people aren't aware how brutal the trade in some parts of the world is and it's not something I would want to be part of.

But hope you enjoy your engagement and congrats!!!

I just mean mind your own as in keep on topic of what the OP is asking. Yeah I know it's not a place people are ever going to mind their own, but it's just boring when people want to steer a thread a certain way...

Oops that ^ was under my other username!

Not that this is site populated by such fiercely judgemental people, that the OP knew, had she come on here and said:

'I've just got engaged, I want a sparkling, flashing bit of bling on my finger and i want to wave it round to show everybody..' she would have expected to be flamed by the 'be a grown-up and a woman and equal (or better) than a man and don't dare to suffer such outdated, repressive things as letting him put a ring on your finger..'?

And instead said something about wanting something hard-wearing.

I suspect she wants the bling and fair play to her, if she wants it and her man wants to make her happy, let her go for it. If she genuinely wants something that will last well enough to pass to her great-great-great grandaughter, she'll go the Titanium/industrial gem route for a smidgeon of the cost.

I think you're getting a rough time here OP.

The way I see it, your DP proposed and said "I've got you this temporary ring so we can pick one that you really want together."

You went out and picked a ring that you love and now he's backing out.

Unless £1500 waaaay more than a month's salary for him (which it doesn't sound like it is) I think he should have put his money where his mouth is long ago.

YANBU; anyone would be disappointed who was promised they could have something and then told no - his actions set you up for disappointment and you should let him know that he's hurt you.

.artificial market? The market price is what people are willing to pay, as for most things surely?

Dr Beers control the majority of the diamond market, they have little competition to encourage price reduction. They buy their competitors, or buy their stock.
Diamonds are much more common than the price suggests, but De Beers controls the supply to push up the cost, by putting lots of the diamonds into long term storage. If all these diamonds were released onto the market the price would fall.
If you buy something gold from a shop and then decide to sell it on immediately to a trader you will get a reasonable amount for it as the price of gold in the shop reflects the price of gold in the market generally.
If you buy a new diamond in a shop and immediately try to sell it to a trader you will receive far less of a proportion of the price you paid because the shop price is inflated to such a huge degree.
Meanwhile diamond selling companies esp de Beers advertise to make diamond rings a 'necessity' creating rules such as two months salary and a myth that this is a longstanding tradition, so that purchasers stretch to spend more, thinking it represents their degree of love, and some posters would call off their engagement for lack of a diamond!
The price of diamond rings reflects the price they want to charge rather than the rarity of diamonds!

I feel for you op. To be given a ring he made himself as a temporary thing, then he was shocked by the price of diamond rings (!), so you still dont have one is poor.

I had a few concerns. And a lot of assumptions.

It seems like he hadnt really put any thought into this (did he really not look at the price of rings when planning a proposal?!).
Has he never heard the price guide for an ering is a month's salary?
Why is he deciding how joint saving can and cannot be spent without discussion or explanation? (Is he financially controlling?)

And my main one, is he reluctant to spend the money as it is something for YOU, rather than something for you both?

The price of precious metals has risen in recent years and £1500 doesn't buy what it used to.

YANBU to want him to show you that you are his priority and that's what the ring symbolises to you. Now tbf a lot of people men don't put that symbolism on the ring and to them it's just overpriced jewellery.

I think you should talk to him about why this is important to you and I don't think you should settle for something cheap. You will wear this every day and seeing as you do have money to pay for it I think you should have what makes you happy. Different matter entirely if you were skint.