to ask my DP why we arent engaged yet?

[BumbleNova]

I dont know if I am being unreasonable or not. I probably am. We have been together 4 years, we have lived together for 3 1/2. I am sure we both want to spend the rest of our lives together, we have discussed it and we have agreed we want kids and (roughly) when we expect that to be.

So the issue is that "we" are buying a house together at the moment. well - I am buying the house (I earn a lot more than he does) with the understanding that it is intended to be our family home.

I am making a real and very hard earned commitment to our future. I have no problem that he isnt contributing financially, but I am unhappy that he isnt committing to me to the same degree? i.e that asking me to marry him should be his part of the deal?

we first looked at rings two years ago today. I honestly couldnt care less about a ring, I dont want a diamond. its what it symbolises. I feel very taken for granted.

how do I raise this in a non-accusatory way? I tried to raise it in a jokey way on holiday about a month ago and he got very defensive. I clearly tried the wrong tack. we got back from a few days just us in a very romantic place last night and I found myself crying silently in the kitchen when we got home. just sheer disappointment. help?!

OP also sounds rather too in awe of him.

I have thought long and hard about asking him. I hate the tradition too. He knows that when we marry I wont take his surname (yes we have even had that conversation). is it so wrong to want him to ask? it just feels so unromantic for me to have to do it.

in terms of future childcare, our intention is that he would be the "house husband" and look after the children. I love my job and my future earning capacity is greater than his, so it makes sense.

Don't wait for a proposal or raise it up n a jokey way. Start a grown up conversation on the lines of 'I would like to get married. How do you feel about it? If you do to, let's discuss a timescale' etc.

Straight talking needed. Tell him you would like to firm up all the discussions you've had about rings and marriage, and is there any reason why you can't set a date and actually buy the ring? Perspicacia suggested a good way to put it.

People don't need to get married. It's a choice and presumably it's what you would prefer. So as others have said you just need to ask him if he agrees and then maybe set a date.
He doesn't owe you a ring anymore than than you owe him one. You could exchange rings if you felt like it but there's no fixed requirement. It's all conventions, traditions and opinions.
The house is yours, you will own it, it's going to be in your name so other than allowing the cohabiting I don't really see your greater commitment.

is it so wrong to want him to ask? it just feels so unromantic for me to have to do it
In a word - yes! You want some nonsense fairytale romantic proposal whilst at the same time being a sensible, professional adult woman with assets to protect and goals to achieve. Why do women cling on to this 'romantic' tradition that basically hands the power to determine their life course over to someone else? Do you think that he needs to propose in order to prove that he means it?

DH and I were together 5yrs before we got engaged, 6 by the time we got married. We bought a house together a fair amount of time before we married. The difference was we had always been open with each other on what we were looking for in/expecting from the relationship, and agreed our preferred order was house-marriage-kids. You need to have a frank discussion with your DP. It might be he's up for marriage, just not yet. He might be ready now, just nervous of taking the plunge (this was my DH). He might never want to marry. Unfortunately without that conversation you just won't know.
If you can afford a house now, I would go ahead and start looking for your preferences keeping in mind that it could be your starter family home with him or another if he weasles off as overall property only goes up in price and the sooner you buy the better IMO.

Geordie there are very sound reasons for getting married. For instance, if the OP was in hospital on life support, her parents and not her partner would decide if she was to be kept alive or not.

Someone proposed to me when I was the only one with a job or any prospects. I loved him and was very excited for about 12 hours. then it suddenly dawned on me that it was backwards. He had basically said, as if he was doing me a favour, "would you like to support me for ever, become responsible for my present and future debts and the fact that I will never ever get my shit together to pay into a pension? Do you want to sit alongside me, broke, with no heating on, when we are 70, thinking about how we can't afford to go out for fish and chips?"

I could have offered that but just because he is the man, he shouldn't get to suggest it.

You can ask him, you know! You need to know whether he'll marry you, so ask him if he'll marry you.

I think some people get tangled up in rings and perfect proposals, and it stops them actually moving forward on the commitment they want to make. We talked about getting married in a vague way, then bought the ring together, then had the proposal scene (well, we had three), and it worked for us.

Think of it as practice for all the good communicating you'll have to do in future!

You think it's "romantic" for women to be passive objects of men's attention?

Um, OK.

But that "romantic" tradition goes along with you being less important than him in every way - he must earn more and keep you, you must cease being tagged by your father and allow your husband to brand you as his own.

HorseyHat - yes he does. however, for fairness reasons, we may move to a ratio per our earnings.

in terms of why now to buy a house - yes rates and i want to start paying my own mortgage rather than someone elses!

TheHouse quite an extreme example and of course it depends on what the respective families are like.
I cohabited for over 20 years. There is very little extra that marriage protects if you are sensible.

bumble, great reasons to buy your house - do it. Keep the whole relationship stuff separate.
Do you mind me asking how old you are?

Despite you earning more than him I presume his job is still a decent one if it takes him abroad for work?

Is it possible that he's getting cold feet about your planned future together with him becoming a SAHD etc? Are those plans mainly yours, his or joint?

X-post.

In terms of having to ask, I think you have to seperate serious life stuff from romance a bit. Have the romance, by all means, but don't have it instead of serious decision making as equals.

After we'd bought a house, chosen a dress and started looking at venues, DP asked me to marry him 'properly'. I had a proposal at the bottom of a helter skelter, and a proposal in a shady arbour at Anne Hathaway's house. They were lovely and romantic. They make lovely stories. They weren't part of the decision making process when we bought a house!

Is shouldn't be 'I am buying the house so he should propose'.

You are buying a house. He has no gain from this, as it should be. And unless you made this a stipulation of buying a house that he will live in, I can't see how he would know that.

Either clearly tell him you want to get married or propose yourself.

You dislike the tradition that he needs to propose, so stop getting upset and annoyed he isn't doing it.

To be fair, it's unlikely to meet your romantic expectations if you say ' I want to be married in 2 years'

Because you will then probably feel he only did it because you said so.

Is that why you don't want to have a proper conversation about this?

I think as you've already brought it up in a 'jokey way' and he reacted badly then proposing to him is the absolute worst thing you could do. You know it's going to go badly, you've already had an insight, although it would at least answer your 'does he want to marry me' question. Can I ask why you aren't buying a place together? As I stated in my earlier post money has nothing to do with that process? He's workibg and earning so why not buy together?
If he's not ready to buy a house with you I think you've got your answer on the marriage question....

Do you see him as an equal partner.

In my relationship there is no such thing who earns the most and rental agreement is in both of our names.

You want him to show you commitment but you are not doing the same.

This house will be yours, the morgage and the deeds will be yours. If you decide to finish the relationship this man will be homeless.

We are both 30. Yes - he does have a very good job. we are very much equals, we just have got out of sync on this one. he was naive and has tax issues which is the reason he cant contribute financially. he feels terrible about this and is getting it sorted. I managed to save for the deposit sooner than expected.

tempus - that is very much his idea. I am open minded about whether or not that happens. I suspect he will get bored and i keep saying that would also be fine - nothing is needs to be decided now.

Asskicker - thats it. I dont want him to do because I said so.

great advice ladies - we need to have a practical conversation about it and romance etc can be separate.

i know comparing yourself to other people is fast track to misery but everyone around us seems to be getting engaged. he even said that he was slow in comparison to his friends. arrgh.

I'm sorry to be rude, but I think you need to snap out of whatever romantic madness is causing you to want to be married. If he is a lower earner, to the extent that it makes sense for him to be a SAHP, then it is by a long way in your best legal interest not to be married to him.

You need to drop all talk of marriage immediately, and think about how you are going to turn him down without losing him if he does put you in an awkward position by proposing.

If the relationship lives up to your hopes and expectations, it will be irrelevant to your finances that you aren't married, as you will voluntarily and happily share with him. On the other hand, if things don't go the way you expect, you will have given up control over sharing in return for ... what?

Someone will be along to say of course you should protect the interest of the poorer person that you love, by marrying them. (Probably someone who identifies more with that person. ) If you are a good person who wants to see that they do well even in the event of divorce, then retaining control by not marrying doesn't stop you doing that. However giving up control, by getting married, means embracing scenarios where you hand over vast amounts of money in a situation where you don't think they should have it.

If he hasn't asked yet he doesn't want to marry you (yet). Saying he has talked about getting married at some future point doesn't mean much when you've been living together for 3 and a half years! He might want to marry you in 12 months or 12 years or never!

There are loads of threads by posters who desperately want to be married and their DP hasn't asked them even after 10 years and two children! They've had lots of conversations about it but their DP 'wants it to be a surprise' or 'it isn't the right time.'

There's nothing wrong with having a conversation about how you feel and setting a deadline - if he doesn't feel ready in the next 12 months then you'll move on.

Yes you buying a house is you buying a house, and it's good that it will be in your name only and he's not involved financially.

If you want to share that house as a marital asset, and give half of it to someone in the case of a divorce, you have to be very sure of it. One solution to that is to never marry. Actually, legally speaking, with the situation you are in, you have less reason to marry than he does.

If he doesn't want to, that suggests he isn't keen on either a) you (sorry) or b) marriage itself.

I have a long-term DP, kids and a house (joint names, he earns more but we split everything equally) and I have never yearned to be married and nor has he, so we are OK with that. If he's the type of person who's suspicious or uncomfortable about marriage, he may be stuck because he doesn't want to do it but he knows you do and he hasn't got the balls to discuss it like an adult.

Or, he may have cold feet or be unsure about the relationship, and not be brave enough to tell you that. I think there's a strong possibility, judging by men I have known, that he feels emasculated by you earning more and obviously being a go-getter and moving things forward with the house purchase etc. You're behaving like an adult and this man may find himself in a childlike role where (maybe not consciously) he sees you like a parent and himself as someone with no adult responsibility.

I think you have to have it out with him - as PPs have said, sit down and have a calm, assertive conversation. "I've been feeling upset because I had been hoping we'd be getting married sooner rather than later, and I want to know how you feel about that, honestly." Take responsibility for the fact you haven't proposed yourself because you were waiting for him to. Ask him straight out if he is unsure about marriage, or if it's the relationship. You need you know – you can't go on forever feeling resentful and not explaining why.

I get it op.

Even though you are a professional sensible woman who can make sound financial choices, you still want to feel loved and wanted. I don't think those 2 sides of a person are at odds. I understand that you might want your dp to make a gesture of commitment that is outside of the commitments you already have organised - ie: house, job, security. Love is not straightforward.

I think that your dp is unsure about asking you because it is the gesture that he is in charge of and wants to get it right. Men are mental and will shilly shally like nobodies business, especially if there are no rules about what to do.

I am not married. But we have an enormous family and are committed. I have asked my dp why we has never asked me, sometimes I feel upset about it. He says that years ago when he was going to ask, I would speak about it in someway and divert him - I often said things like 'oh I don't know about marriage it is outdated/anti feminist/oppressive' or 'are you ever going to ask me...?' He got so confused by my mixed messages (which any woman could have interpreted correctly as an emerging fear of him not asking and me not being loved enough) that he couldn't do it. So decades on we are still unmarried and I can honestly say that it still pisses me off. So, make sure you are being clear as others have said and also realise that the proposal is not the marriage....the marriage is already happening, you guys working all the stuff out together and making plans, buying houses, planning kids. That is the 'marriage'. But if you want the gesture, let him know.

My partner won't propose until we "can afford a wedding" so might be something similar, then again if you can afford a house you could probably afford to get married. Definitely have a chat with him, if you really want marriage, then he needs to decide if it's in the cards for him or not.