To think that women should stop starting families before they get the ring?

[MeteorGarden]

Ok so hear me out.

I’ve read a few threads now from women who have got themselves into the same difficult situation and judging by hundreds of comments, they are seriously not alone!

They desperately want to marry DP who ‘always said he would’ But now (a few children/ years later) has declared he has no intention of marrying them.

It follows the same pattern, OP wanted to marry early on and DP was open to it but didn’t actually pop the question. OP didn’t force the issue (god forbid she be labelled ‘pushy’ or ‘crazy’) and instead started a family with DP (OP seemed under the delusion that having his children would make him propose).

Why!??
A) Would anyone ‘start a family’ with a man who isn’t proposing to you? If he’s open to it why isn’t he doing it?
B) Is having children becoming just an alternative to getting the ring/ security you want?
C) Would anyone think having his children will make him propose? If you have the kids without a ring it’s fair for him to assume you’re happy enough with the current situation!
D) are so many women put off flatly asking for what they want? It’s terribly backward to just quietly have his children and keep his home in the hope that one day you’ll be ‘rewarded’ you with a proposal! We’re living in a society where you can carry his children but feel uncomfortable asking WHEN he’s going to propose and pushing the issue?!?!

The stories I’ve read are horribly deflating and I empathise with their explanations of frustration and humiliation but wonder if perhaps it could have all been avoided?

We have so much more freedom and independence than our grandmothers, but we’re expected to pretend we don’t care about marriage or kids for the first year of dating so as ‘not to scare a man away’!! WtF?

I wouldn’t ever plan a family with any man I wasn’t married to. It was spelt out to me that the time to lock down my chosen relationship was BEFORE I had children or made irreversible sacrifices!

This kind of thinking seems to instil fury in a lot of modern women but why? Taking the more ‘modern’ approach really doesn’t seem to be working out very well for alot of women so would a bit more tradition In our approach to getting the ring really be that bad?

Maybe if women banded together and made ‘getting the ring’ more socially acceptable we’d be able to push the point and get answers before wasting years with a guy and learning the hard way! Right now it feels men have more power over the marriage process than they really should!

* This applies only to women who ‘want’ to marry but aren’t getting the ring. Not those who don’t want to marry!

@CherryAide

Sorry, that wasn't a pop at you. You're post just happened to fall before. Wishing you a lovely pregnancy

@Sunflowersforever ha! Don't worry I didn't presume it was

I shouldn't be shocked by posters chiming in just to add that they have no sympathy and that if you want the protection of marriage get married.

Does that contribution add anything that HELPS women? It just shows an ostrich head in the sand approach to the way society has evolved to make marriage unnecessary for men (whilst women still earn less on average )combined with an i'm alright jack mentality.

Morbid question, but if a mother dies in childbirth and was not married to her partner, would the baby be taken into care until he could prove he was the father??

I think the other thing that has done women a grave disservice is that marriage has evolved to become a big event a very expensive consumer experience. People start to think that that's what's expected of them and as they can't afford it they just settle down raising children when actually in the past their marriage was prioritised then a cheaper wedding was better than no wedding at all

In that case, roundabout, the father would have no legal rights at all. The baby's next of kin would, I'm guessing, be the mother's family.

In general, having children is a bigger commitment than marriage for the woman, because she is probably going to be one left holding the baby if the relationship ends, whether they were married or not. Getting married is generally a bigger commitment than having children for men, because they don't have to grow and give birth to the child, they probably won't take a long maternity leave or be a stay at home parent, and they probably won't have custody if they split up. They would have to pay child maintenance whether married or not, but they'd only be liable for child maintenance or made to share their assets if they were married.

Obviously there are some exceptions to the rule, but this still holds true for most couples.

Threads like this show what a mess the whole situation is.

On the one hand, you've got a lot of people who are (quite rightly) happy that we're moving away from the kind of archaic and rigidly structured society where to be an unmarried woman is a sad fate, to cohabit without legal union is to 'live in sin', and where children born out of wedlock suffer social disadvantage.

Nobody wants to go back to that.

At the same time, the wedding industry has managed to conflate marriage itself with a set of expensive, superficial conventions: the white dress, the diamond ring, Your Most Special Day. Getting married is perceived to involve great expense and preparation, and many people feel social pressure to put on a big event; this often leads to deferring marriage indefinitely (especially if you have a young family) or rejecting it entirely ('I don't need a ring to prove our love...' etc etc).

There's also confusion about what marriage legally offers, and whether or not 'common law marriage' is a thing.

What hasn't changed is that women are still the ones who have kids, and we're disproportionately likely to take a financial hit for doing so. It's not enough to just say 'women, be financially independent'. That bears no resemblance to the reality of being a lone parent in a country with expensive childcare, a relatively high cost of living, and stagnant wages/inflexible work hours/zero hour contracts.

If your sole income comfortably covers all childcare, the mortgage, bills and an emergency reserve, part of me thinks: fantastic, good for you, but another part wants to say: you're the exception and it's so I'm-alright-Jack to come on here and insinuate other women are stupid or careless for not being in your position. The odds are you're university educated; well-established in an industry where you can take maternity leave without destroying your progression; well-compensated; you either have understanding employers who'll let you off to deal with emergencies (childcare falls through, illness) or have an excellent support network. Maybe you don't have any of this, but do have some other asset: your family provide childcare, you live mortgage-free.

Either way, there are plenty of women who work just as hard as you, for a lot less money and with little job security or progression. If they have children, as Sunflowers said, they very much do need a legal framework to give protection and clarity. Acting like marriage is an archaic institution for lazy ladies stuck in the 1800s, or a frivolous excuse for a party, is entirely misrepresenting its current importance for a large number (probably the majority) of women with young children.

Well said Matcha.

Although of course no one has to do the big wedding either, trendy or no. I didn’t.

Indeed roundabout. The cohabitants posting on these threads often mention wills, trusts etc and as the MN demographic skews much more educated and MC than average, I imagine most of them are telling the truth. Meanwhile, most people are terrible at this sort of thing. If you are terrible, which you shouldn't be but there is a realistic chance that you are, marriage will for many people do a lot of what you want for you. This assumes you want to leave stuff to your partner though, which many people don't.

Sweetheart I've been married 16 years and still haven't got ' the ring '
People have do what's right for them and in my case it was marriage but it wasn't hanging a piece of expensive metal on my finger to show I'm owned !

I don't want a ring...

I bite my nails so it would look shit in the obligatory "he proposed!" Facebook pictures anyway.

But in pictures of my son he's so gorgeous no one notices my horrendous cuticles

(Misses point of thread)

@bluelady what utter rubbish. In the event an unmarried woman dies in childbirth her family has no more parental rights to her child than the father. Either would have to go to court to get them and the court would decide in the best interest of the parents.

Let’s hope your son’s condoms don’t fail eh!

I know plenty of women who have chosen not to marry but have had children with their OH.

Plenty of women out there who are the main bread winner and provide their own security.

It's about personal choice

Best interest of child not parents sorry! FYI everyone, we have quick and reliable dna testing these days. It actually isn’t the 40s no matter what some might think

I think men should stop starting families until they've signed an an unbreakable obligation to support their child 50%.

Or we have a govt that actually fucking enforces the laws that are meant to be there to protect the children.

I did say I assumed, zsa. Yup, let's hope they don't. All a bit academic anyway as he's currently unpartnered.

@kickass what about parents should support their children. It’s a scandal that so many men and a few women tie themselves in knots to avoid paying for their own kids.

In my case though he doesn’t pay anything and doesn’t have any money. The difference if we had been married is that I would have to give him a wedge of mine.

in your opinion op. I don't want to get married. Trust is the only real sense of security there is. No one in their right mind would think a child equals security.We have children because we want them.

I think the issue is when it isn't women making a choice. A woman who believes she will be treated like a wife when she won't is not making an informed choice.

Say the woman has more in assets like in my case I don't want to have to give half to a partner I want to leave it all to my daughter.

And you're one of the women who wouldn't benefit from marriage, user. The issue is women who would, whose partners won't marry them.

I had a child with ex dp. We weren’t married, in my instance luckily as I earn more.
Marriage doesn’t protect women exclusively.; it protects the less well off partner, be it male or female.

Society / the law / the workplace / childcare should be structured so that children are protected and don’t have to live in poverty / not see the other parent etc.

Relationships willl always fail. In previous generations, people stuck in less than satisfying relationships because they had fewer options open to them.

Those 'but I trust him, he's not like that, he will totally take care of us' - you are probably not fully realising how patronising you sound. So all the women on the Relationships board, who also thought their partner was decent, and have found out that is not the case - they are what, just stupid? Got into the relationship thinking that ah well never mind that he's a total bastard? Trust is lovely but legally counts for fuck all.