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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

to ask my DP why we arent engaged yet?

183 replies

BumbleNova · 04/01/2016 11:14

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 posts:
HowBadIsThisPlease · 04/01/2016 16:52

He might not be maliciously freeloading but, OP, if you do marry this chap you need to be aware that you will probably always be driving everything. This might suit you. On the other hand, while it might seem easy to drive everything now while you are fit and childless, at some point in the future you might wish that some part of what you are doing can be handed over to a true partner. You might breastfeed a velcro baby for a year; you might get PND or SPD or any number of birth related complications; you might be simply knackered

In principle i agree that you could propose but in practice, think very hard about what that demonstrates about what happens between you about who picks up which responsibilities.

The tax thing is terrifying. I am sure he is lovely and the issues are complicated, but people who are financially accident prone.... are financially accident prone. you can - to some extent - manage this tendency towards financial misadventure through your own attention to detail (assuming he is not a gambler or an addict or malicious - not suggesting he is) but think hard about having to be on top of everything - your business, his business, your joint business - all the time

Birdsgottafly · 04/01/2016 16:53

He might not want to saddle the OP with his debts and/or want to see how the bankruptcy pans out.

But they need an honest conversation. The DP might be wanting this, but might be slightly humiliated by the situation.

He might see him being a SAHD as a good solution to all the issues, but then I've known plenty of women that have felt the same and they've had long happy marriages.

It's up to the individuals what sort of set up, or partnership that they want.

Both parties have got to want the same thing, though and be aware what these roles actually mean.

If he is a SAHD, then that shed may not get the usage he's envisaging.

leedy · 04/01/2016 16:59

This is one of those threads where I genuinely feel like I live on a different planet to many of the other posters. Particularly the "if they don't propose within a year then they're not really interested"/"most men don't want to commit, you have to make them get married so they don't have an out" stuff.

I must tell all this to my partner of 17 years, who is co-owner of my house, and father of my two children. I hadn't realized he was just biding his time until he could do a runner...

NinaSharp · 04/01/2016 17:06

Ditto, leedy...

Also there's clearly absolutely no way he might be wanting to protect the OP from having a shared financial risk...

Babycham1979 · 04/01/2016 17:07

But Leedy, didn't you know? Men are just big children that desperately need the civilising influence of a wife/second mother in their lives to prevent them from going off the rails?

Obviously, conversely, ladies are the more evolved and civilised members of teh species; they just know that marriage is the only way rein-in the beasts.

For homework, I recommend watching the Sense and Sensibility box-set. On repeat. Until you realise that you're misguided and you see the error of your ways.

GnomeDePlume · 04/01/2016 17:07

in my experience if men know they want to get married to a person they propose very quickly (in the first year) I have seen it time and time again ...the ones who know they are with the right one propose quick and the unsure ones, well, don't.

My experience is the total opposite. I asked DH (then DP). He wasnt bothered either way but recognised that I was. It wasnt an ultimatum just a sensible grown up talk. We also went down the route of DH being SAHP as my earnings power was significantly greater. We will be celebrating our silver wedding anniversary this year.

In the end it is the commitment to each other which counts. It doesnt matter who does the asking, how big the diamonds are.

JohnLuther · 04/01/2016 17:14

I agree Leedy, there's so much bollocks in this thread I don't know where to start. I proposed to DW after five years which immediately means that:

in my experience if men know they want to get married to a person they propose very quickly (in the first year) I have seen it time and time again ...the ones who know they are with the right one propose quick and the unsure ones, well, don't.

Is utter crap.

suzannecaravaggio · 04/01/2016 17:28

it's really hard to predict how society will change

indeed, it is notoriously difficult to make predictions
especially ones about the future :o

the whole way that relationships and families are structured may change, there must be a better way to do things, some way of having partnerships which recognizes that partnering for life just doesnt work for many people but we still need to do the best for the children that we bring forth.

There must be some way of dissolving partnerships which minimizes the stress to all parties

SevenOfNineTrue · 04/01/2016 18:12

Desperately waiting for the next copy of Smash Hits

devoncreamtea · 04/01/2016 21:08

babycham!!! I am not taking that!!! Jane Austen was constantly pointing out the absurdity of marriage, if she were alive today she would have been straight on mumsnet poking fun at social mores - she was a right maverick!

devoncreamtea · 04/01/2016 21:08
Wink
iminshock · 04/01/2016 22:26

Whoever said this up thread. - best post on mumsnet in years :

"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."

iminshock · 04/01/2016 22:28

OP. Could you please answer the question asked already .
If you buy the house, it's all in your name them you marry, does he or does he not have a claim on it if you were unfortunately to divorce.?

PaulDirac · 04/01/2016 22:31
Confused
Samantha28 · 04/01/2016 22:58

If you buy the house, it's all in your name them you marry, does he or does he not have a claim on it if you were unfortunately to divorce.?

He would have in Scotland, as it's the marital home. Don't know where the OP lives.

suzannecaravaggio · 04/01/2016 23:18

I loved him and was very excited for about 12 hours. then it suddenly dawned on me that it was backwards

Would that I had such prescience in my youth!

suzannecaravaggio · 04/01/2016 23:21

To have taken a cold sober look at the probable future whilst in the grip of the oxytocin intoxication haze
That's quite a feat!

Lightbulbon · 04/01/2016 23:30

Nrft but be careful about him being the sahp- if you split he will get your kids and your house.

Some will say it's selfish but in your set up you'd be better off not marrying.

Epilepsyhelp · 04/01/2016 23:36

What lightbulbon said. Why the rush to become legally responsible for a financial liability.

ItsANewDayToday · 04/01/2016 23:49

I am playing devils advocate here but do you think he doesn't want to marry you because it's bothering him that you want him to marry him but that you don't trust the relationship/him/yourself enough to want to put the house in both of your names equally. Might he be thinking that you are more interested in the wedding rather than a lifelong commitment.

I DONT think this myself I'm just thinking of reasons he might not be wanting to marry you.

Headofthehive55 · 05/01/2016 00:03

I think you are seeing it as a romantic thing. It isn't. It needs discussion just like buying a house.

Mrsbennington · 05/01/2016 00:17

Leedy I must tell all this to my partner of 17 years, who is co-owner of my house, and father of my two children. I hadn't realized he was just biding his time until he could do a runner...

Lovely that you are in such a secure relationship but if you or him dies or does do a runner then aside from the house you have nothing.

PaulDirac · 05/01/2016 00:25

Do you mean if Leedy's partner dies she will not have access to former wages etc? What if they have life insurance? Maybe Leedy and her partner are both financially stable independently of one another?

Werksallhourz · 05/01/2016 01:20

I am not going to mention the financial and legal aspects here because previous posters have done a bang up job of that, but I did want to contribute something.

In my experience, a lot of men don't quite understand life-course lead times the way women do. They don't have that biological clock that forces a lot of professional women who want families to plot backwards from age 40.

This sentence, I think, is key ... I am making a real and very hard earned commitment to our future.

I suspect you are unhappy about the lack of marriage proposal because, subconsciously, you want to get started on creating the circumstances you want in place for having a married family life. You already want to buy a house but you are probably aware that looking at various potential properties to buy and and the day you sit on your sofa in a home that doesn't need any major renovation or redecoration, well, you can be talking about a fair amount of time.

Crikey, even getting through the purchasing process can be problematic -- chains break down, survey come back with serious issues etc ...

So I could understand it if, in your mind, you are taking this into account and seeing that there is possibility you could be 33, 34, 35 before you are actually in a home where you feel safe, secure and unstressed enough to start ttc. And then, you see, there is that nagging anxiety that ttc might not entirely go to plan and you will be already in your mid-30s.

So you may have all this going on in your head, but you have a DP who doesn't entirely seem on board with the programme and doesn't seem to recognise that, for you, there isn't an endless amount of time to just muse upon things -- and this is why, I suspect, the lack of marriage proposal is upsetting you so much. You want to move forward; he doesn't appear to be in the same mindset.

My advice would be to sit down with your DP and explain what you want from life and what that means in terms of personal deadlines for you. You need to say that you want to be married, own a home and have a family, and, because you are now 30, these ideas are no longer just abstract concepts and need considering from a practical and time-based perspective.

It is quite probable that he just doesn't realise some of this. If you have told him, for example, that you would like your first child by 36 (because you don't want to wait or because you want more than one child), he may not actually compute that means starting ttc in the next three to four years. And, again, he may not compute that finding, buying and sorting a house out can take two, three, four years if both of you are working full-time and he works abroad a lot.

In my opinion, you and your DP need to have a serious practical discussion about this. If he refuses to talk about it, then that says something. But you do need to have that conversation and he needs to hear your perspective and you need to hear his.

leedy · 05/01/2016 09:36

"Do you mean if Leedy's partner dies she will not have access to former wages etc? What if they have life insurance? Maybe Leedy and her partner are both financially stable independently of one another?"

We are both extremely financially stable independently of each other (both could pay the full mortgage out of our own salary if necessary), we have made wills/sorted out life insurance etc, he has legal guardianship of our children, etc. Obviously it would be different if one of us was financially dependent on the other, but currently if he did a runner I'd be financially pretty OK. Sole problem would be inheritance tax if one of us died, I think.

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