to want to get married?

[Lemond1fficult]

My partner and I have been together 9 years. We live together, and are well-matched, solvent and happy. Except for one thing: We've always agreed we never want to get married. But in the last year, for reasons I don't really understand, I have completely changed my mind.

I'm not one to wait around to be proposed to, so we have discussed it. But my dp hates the idea of a formalised relationship.He wants to throw a big party for our 10th anniversary instead. (To be clear, i want a low-key registry office job and a marriage, not the whole bridal bit). Obvs I wish he would change his mind, but I have no interest in bullying him into something he doesn't want.

So here's the thing: I'm worried it's turning me into a complete nutjob. I had to go to my room at a recent wedding because I got so upset. And because it's making me so crazy, I'm actually considering ending a relationship that is the envy of our friends.

AIBU?

[Charley50]

You said you pay the utilities. Do you pay all of them it so you split them? If you pay more than him, he's kind of charging you rent isn't he?
I agree that getting married would make sense regarding doubling the inheritance allowance threshold. If you don't get married it would be a good idea for you to buy a property.

[Charley50]

I meant 'do you split them?'

[SanityClause]

If marriage is not important to him, why would he object to marrying you? If it's unimportant, why would he care either way?

You want to think marriage is all about love. Well, it is. It's about loving someone enough to want to ensure their financial security, into their old age, and after your death.

Anyway, as others have said, under the current circumstances, you really should ensure that you provide for your own future, which your current meagre savings will not do.

[leedy]

"If marriage is not important to him, why would he object to marrying you? If it's unimportant, why would he care either way? "

Some people do have genuine issues with the institution of marriage, though - it's not that it's "meaningless" to them, they may object on principle to the idea of this type of state involvement in their personal lives, or feel it's a patriarchal institution with unpleasant historical connotations, etc. etc.

(My ex and I have often joked that the fact that he wrote a book about the history of marriage is the reason why neither of us have married our long-term partners. DP and I have occasionally considered doing it at some stage purely to deal with inheritance tax but it will be done grudgingly if we do.)

[motherinferior]

What Leedy said. Marriage is important to me: I'm not keen on it. Like Leedy, I may find myself blackmailed into it by financial policy, but if my partner tried emotional blackmail on me I would be furious.

[NameChange30]

But no one has suggested that the OP tries to emotionally blackmail her partner into getting married, have they?

I would have thought emotional blackmail was obviously a bad idea in most if not all circumstances!

[motherinferior]

It's been suggested she 'threaten him' with ending the relationship. I'd find that a bit out of order if my partner did it to me.

[suzannecaravaggio]

I didn't say she shoud threaten to end it

Besides a threat doesn't have to be explicitly issued
If one person is aware that being married is very important to the other..., to the extent at it becomes a deal breaker then the other partner faces a 'threat' that the relationship may end and they will have to weigh up their options

[NameChange30]

Well, if she decides it's a deal breaker she might decide to end the relationship. It's all about how you approach the discussion and word it. Obviously I wouldn't suggest making any threats. But if it's making her question the relationship I don't think there would be anything wrong in saying that's how she feels. I suggested talking it out as I think that's the only way through this, whatever the outcome.

[NameChange30]

Cross post!

[Twowrongsdontmakearight]

If someone says that they never want to get married it might well mean that deep down they don't want to marry YOU. Like previous posters my ex was anti marriage but married the person he went out with after me.

So with my now DH I gave an ultimatum. He couldn't see the point of marriage but said he wanted me for life. I gave him about 6 months to have a think about it. But if he'd said no to marrying I'd have had to end it. We've been happily married for 17 years. Marriage did feel different for me. Much more secure and content.

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

Some people do have genuine issues with the institution of marriage, though - it's not that it's "meaningless" to them, they may object on principle to the idea of this type of state involvement in their personal lives, or feel it's a patriarchal institution with unpleasant historical connotations, etc. etc.

I may find myself blackmailed into it by financial policy

I just don't get this. We need a way for the state to know who our nearest and dearest are so that we have the correct status, rights and obligations in each other's lives.

At birth our parents' names are recorded on the birth certificate, and from that it's possible to work out who our siblings are. If adopted, the child gets a new birth certificate that shows the new parents. Once we're adult, if we pair off with someone and want to be treated as the most important person in that other person's life, to get all the legal advantages that bestows (e.g. with inheritance tax, but also being the one to make decisions about end of life care and the funeral) - why, then the law provides one simple, neat, economical way to get the recognition: marriage. At a stroke of the pen, you move to the top of the list. Your relationship to your partner will be recognised all over the world.

People who don't want to get married should surely accept that that inevitably means they don't get the advantages of marriage. You weigh up the pros and cons and make your decision. The historical connotations are utterly irrelevant to that decision in 2016.

[GnomeDePlume]

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g I totally agree with you. One of the nice things about the state of marriage is that it doesnt exist until both parties agree that they want it to exist. There is no assumption that a quasi marriage exists. On the whole the state doesnt peer into the bedroom.

Marriage is a very serious institution. It doesnt exist until both parties agree and are in a position to agree (ie old enough and not already married). A marriage exists until it is formally ended by death or divorce. It is not possible to be legally married to more than one person.

This is the reason for the formality of marriage.

[FrancisdeSales]

Marriage is also not some recently imposed state institution. Marriage predates all current Western institutions and faiths. In all of recorded history marriage has existed. There are many reasons why a public commitment to a permanent relationship have been a hallmark of civilization across the globe.

[leedy]

"Marriage predates all current Western institutions and faiths."

Not in its current form, it doesn't. It was also until relatively recently largely a means of forming familial alliances/managing property and was usually arranged by the spouses' parents. "Loving commitment by individuals" had feck-all to do with it, unless you were a peasant, and they mostly didn't bother getting married at all.

"The historical connotations are utterly irrelevant to that decision in 2016."

Nope.

[motherinferior]

And again, what she said.

[motherinferior]

Come to that I've had plenty of lecturing from relatives on how marriage is about families not individuals. But then not all of us

(Wanders off humming 'what's love got to do with it'...)

[motherinferior]

Come to that I've had plenty of lecturing from relatives on how marriage is about families not individuals. But then not all of us are entirely Western.

(Wanders off humming 'what's love got to do with it'...)

[GnomeDePlume]

But the historical connotations are only relevant if that is what you choose them to be. People are getting married in 2016 not 1916 or 1316.

[GnomeDePlume]

If the OP’s DP doesn’t want to marry because he:

• Doesn’t want to be automatic next of kin to the OP and vice versa
  
• Wants his assets to be his alone and consumed by care home fees in his old age
  
• Wants to be able to start/end the relationship by unilateral and not necessarily communicated decision
  
• Doesn’t want to have the relationship automatically recognised in any country he, she or they visit at any point in the future
  
• Wants to be able to disinherit the OP entirely by unilateral and not necessarily communicated decision
  
• Wants to be able to marry someone different without formally ending the relationship with OP
  
  then that is what he is totally entitled to decide but that is what not formalising the relationship means.

[leedy]

Er, I'm not married and it's not because I'm loving having the option to disinherit DP in his old age ("hey, it's going to be HILARIOUS when I change my will when I'm 80, MAXIMUM LOLZ"), or suddenly decide to dump him and marry somebody else. I have not decided "not to formalize the relationship" because I really want those things, thank you very much, and that may also be the case for the OP's DP.

I am well aware that there are many material advantages to marriage, but it's a bit much to suggest that when people don't want to get married it means that they actively don't want the relevant responsibilities, or that it's only marriage/"formalizing the relationship" that ensures that level of commitment from your partner (as clearly without the legally binding contract they'd be legging it at the slightest provocation "by unilateral and not necessarily communicated decision"). It's all a bit reminiscent of the anti-divorce campaign here in Ireland where it was suggested that it was only the ban on divorce that stopped husbands leaving their families in droves. HELLO DIVORCE, GOODBYE DADDY.

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

I'm not saying that at all. I'm just saying that if you don't have that bit of paper you don't have any legal status in your partner's life at all. I would find that unsettling.

[leedy]

"I would find that unsettling."

I don't, at all, really. I think you're slightly projecting here and hence assuming that anyone in a LTR who doesn't want to get married is somehow unreasonable ("But why would anyone not want these things? I want these things! Clearly anyone who doesn't want these things is weird/stupid/suspicious/ignorant/requires enlightening!"), and/or that if they don't it clearly shows a lack of commitment to their relationship.

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

Yes, I probably am projecting. That doesn't remove the fact that people who choose not to get married are either having to spend quite a lot of money on legal fees to replicate some of the protections marriage would have bestowed, or they are leaving themselves exposed in ways a good many of them don't even realise. A cursory glance at the Relationships board here shows that.

[leedy]

"That doesn't remove the fact that people who choose not to get married are either having to spend quite a lot of money on legal fees to replicate some of the protections marriage would have bestowed, or they are leaving themselves exposed in ways a good many of them don't even realise."

We went the former route. :)