To ask how many people are haplily marrried to their soul mate and how many people feel they 'settled'?

[Desperatetobeamummyonedaysoon]

As title suggests.. im not looking for judgements and ceiticism but interested to know if many women on here spent their 20s and early 30s focussed on their career and independence etc and suffendly mid 30s panicked, wanted a family and 'settled'? Im 37 soon and realistically times running out for a family.. do you settle for a decent guy and have a family knowing thr relationship may not last or do you 'hold out for true love' and run the very real risk of missing out on longed for children??

Absolute soul mate, every cliche going. We are intrinsically linked and adore one another (cue gagging noises)

Settled is a harsh term. But I deliberately kept an open mind with DH as I'd spent years being treated like crap and I knew he'd put me first and do what he said he'd do.

Having said that, we're total opposites, I was bored stiff for years and we have nothing in common. I nearly left.

Then I just started to push for stuff that I wanted. We moved, I got my animals who are my everything. And we had DD. She's amazing and he is the most wonderful dad to her. He also now (in true Mumsnet style) has a hobby he's really keen on which has made him happier I think.

As the years go by we've sort of shifted and moulded. We know each other inside out, we know how to "handle" each other and we're laughing a bit more, make a good team and co-exist very happily. I would be exhausted being madly in love with someone who fits my type. But that's not to say I don't have a couple of guys from my past who never quite left my head and about whom I wonder "what if."

I don't believe in soulmates. I do feel passionately for DH, as much as I ever did. We drive each other mad sometimes. Sometimes we are like ships in the night and it all seems like too much hard work. There are weeks and months where not much effort is made on either side. But we always find each other again.

Meeting my DH wasn't all excitement and hearts and flowers and romance and whatever else people are defining "soulmates" as here. It was the opposite in fact. It was the easiest, simplest thing I've ever experienced - something clicked into place when he smiled at me and I thought "oh, it's YOU, there you are" and knew instantly that he would feel the same and we would get married etc. There was no nervousness, no butterflies, no great romantic gestures - just a quiet peace that felt like coming home. Of course there was romance and lust and butterflies when we were dating, but honestly that was a side product of this deep soul connection that formed the basis of a solid and lasting partnership.

But I thought the concept was nonsense before I met him too, so I don't really blame people for being doubtful. But in my experience it was the opposite of Mills and Boon etc.

Oh and it's not to say that our marriage doesn't take work - of course it does, especially with a small baby! But it's good work that I enjoy doing and do willingly and gladly.

I met DH when I was 20 and was smitten straight away, as was he. Next week is the 40th anniversary of when we met, and we are still happily together.

Ditto!

We started writing to eachother as friends on our university year abroad in 1978. From our letters, over time I felt like he was my "soul mate" - we came from very different backgrounds but had so many shared outlooks.

Anyway, soul mate or not, we've been together happily ever since, so he must have been "the one".

I've never believed in the concept of soul mates, for me it's in the same league of people calling each other "hubby/wifey" (shudders).

However, I've been with my partner for 14 years and honestly couldn't be happier. We're two very different people but that difference compliments each other. We're also TTC. I couldn't imagine settling.

Don't think it's a good idea to settle if there's kids involved TBH as you'll never be free from them as they'll always be the child's DF and you'll need to co-parent even if you break up. I think it's better to be alone than be in a bad relationship. I agree with PP though, I don't believe in 'soulmates' per se either just people you click with (usually comes from a similar outlook on life IMHO).

DP isn't my soulmate or best friend. I know five other people who make me laugh more than he does.

But he's a brilliant dad and a kind, considerate housemate. I have a good job but local house prices would have me in a one bed flat if was on my own.

It's all choices. Being with him gives me the foundation to enjoy all the things I love in life. It works and it's mostly great.

Most of my friends feel similarly.

@MorrisZapp I think that, on a good day, what you've written about your OH is how my OH feels about me. I find that pretty devastating most days. I love him, but it's complicated and I definitely don't think he's my soul mate or even my best friend. I feel all at odds with him most of the time now, especially since our child.

If 'real' passion came by again, for either of us, I don't think our relationship would survive. 'Settling' and compromising works if its a mutual thing, but if you come to it 'under false pretenses' as it were, then the feeling of having missed your chance to be truly loved for who you are is agonising to the 'less loved' party.

DP and I are on the same page. I'm pretty sure he feels the same way I do. We even went off sex at about the same time :)

I'm so sorry you feel less loved, I wish I had advice but I don't really know how to help. I think most long term relationships involve huge amounts of compromise. Here's a hug anyway xx

I didn’t settle. Married my soul mate and now have a one year old. Would never have had a baby if I hadn’t met him!

Settled

Without descending into stomach-churning smuggery - I would say DH is my soul mate. (Except, of course, I would never actually say this to anyone!)

Well, if there's a soulmate phenomenon that you only believe if you experience it, but at least half the people on this thread don't believe in, then it's a bloody shit soulmate phenomenon. What's the good of there being a soulmate for everyone if only half of us (generous estimate!) ever find him? Should I be trawling the Gobi desert, maybe? :)

I don't believe there's a The One or anything weird and magical. I do believe in some people getting on with each other better than others. (To be honest, some people get along with everyone better than others! But sure, man A will suit woman A better than man B does.)

I've also experienced the feeling of "Oh, I recognise you", but never with a man, just with female friends. It's a funny feeling, and in my experience it does usually turn out to be about right. I'd just call it a gut feeling that this person is similar, though. I've only ever felt it strongly with other English people, for instance. As the sea I'm fishing in is 99% German, that probably means I'm less likely to experience it with a potential partner - shame.

Name then I think it’s up the the partner who feels less loved to recognise this and say it’s not working for them.

That’s why I dint like the idea of ‘settling in’.
I have no issue with staying with someone because it makes financial sense, because it allows you to have a life that works for you etc.. wo all the love/soulmate stuff/or even friend stuff.
But if it doesn’t work for you, then it’s up to you to change that.

I am in a similar position. I am with H for financial reasons. It feels safer for me atm. But I have no doubt that once the dcs have left home, things will change and it won’t be enough anymore.
My assumption is that it works for H too. Why should I assume the opposite of he is happy going along with it, doesn’t complain about the lack of love etc...??

I think a soulmate is a nice idea but it has failed me in the past. One of my exes was absolutely my soulmate, we utterly adored each other, laughed until sobbing, stayed up all night talking etc. But the sex died very quickly because it began to feel like shagging my brother or something. And he had a very dark, complicated side.

By the time we split up I felt so relieved to be free of him

@MorrisZapp I'll take the hug! Glad you and your H feel the same way about it. Esp re the sex - I think mismatched sex drives are even harder to live with than mismatched love!

@EtVoilaBrexit Well that's a fair point. Does your H know you're only with him for financial reasons? It took me a while to work out that my DP doesn't love me. Now we're in it deep and have a child, so it isn't as simple as just deciding it 'doesn't work for me' - it works better than the alternative, most of the time, as long as I don't mind feeling rather wistful and occasionally angry. I don't want my child to have to negotiate two homes, new partners and step/half siblings (been there, done that, bought the dysfunction - hence my circumstances probably). So I suppose you could say I am also doing what works for me, for now. But that doesn't mean it's what I thought I was signing up for, and it doesn't mean it doesn't hurt to realise I spent my 20s and a huge amount of emotional energy on someone for whom I was, ultimately, a means to an end. If I had understood the limits of what he was offering then I don't think we would have got to this point.

name I dint sign for it either!
I didn’t sign to discover my H is in the spectrum and has Alexithymia (which is why I rarely ‘get’ how he is feeling and he doesn’t really know either)
It was great at the start as he appeared always calm and composed from the outside. Not so great now if we need to talk about feelings.

My dcs are older than yours but if I had had that sort of insight 10 years ago (dcs would have just started primary) I would have chosen to leave. Not now - financial reasons but not just that. The dcs having to be two houses wouldn’t have been the biggest issue for me.

I get the anger having spent years spending energy to make a marriage work when actually I will never get my needs met within that marriage (due to the ASD/Alexithymia).
One the biggest decision for me has been to say that I am not responsible for H emotional well-being, his happiness. Only him can say if the situation as it is ok iyswim.

Seeing that the best I got in the last 10+ years is ‘I care about you’, I think it’s fair.

It’s interesting that many people who believe that they’ve met their soulmate, are also among those who met their partner in their early twenties. So you’ve grown up together and probably shaped each other.

I do think it’s a key ingredient, having no baggage, early twenties, still unsure about a lot so if you can compromise and work together. You haven’t been knocked so hard that you lack trust. Or had a previous marriage or kids. It’s a lot harder to feel like someone’s soulmate if you have the mess and possible resentments of previous relationships. It’s harder too to feel that you are the special one. As you know that they felt like this before.

I’m a little jealous of marriages where they’ve found a good partner young and built a life. They seem on the whole happy and successful.

It’s a lot harder in our thirties and older to get that.

I don’t blame women for settling for kids. It’s a big thing to forgo having a family, and sperm donors are still quite an outlier, and not very accepted. Most of us just just want the normal kids and love.

Having said that. I am still to meet my soulmate. Had a few already. I’ve had a rich and interesting life, which I wouldn’t have had if I’d got one man and married early.

@etvoila yes current DP on the spectrum and emotionally unavailable much of the time. Hard to feel like someone’s soulmate when they give very little to make you feel special.

Settled seems a bit harsh. But I wouldn't say DH is The Greatest Love I Ever Could Have Had, though I'm very unromantic and not sure I ever would have met such a person. Been together 15 years, married for 9, and I've never met a bloke who made a heavenly choir sing in my head and made me wish I'd waited for him. Indeed I'm past 40 now and if I'd waited for that heavenly choir, I'd never have had my amazing kids, or possibly any amazing kids. So I'm fine with it.

I think we should accept everyone's experience - for some, nothing less than The One will do, and we shouldn't sneer at them, nor should we see it as 'sad' if someone else builds a life they are satisfied with but they don't think is their dream partner.

There tends to be a ‘sweet spot’ of 28-32 for people who tend to do well in marriage. On either side of this age range divorce rates increase by 5% by each year. The link to the source is below.

That kind of makes sense anecdotally too. People who marry too young (and for people born in the 80s and 90s, 25 is too young) or too old (32+)) tend to have relationship or personality issues.

ifstudies.org/blog/want-to-avoid-divorce-wait-to-get-married-but-not-too-long/

The fact I didn't get married until my fourties indicates I didn't "settle". I would be with DH after many years of kiving alone, if I didn't think he was the one for me.

So much of a life worth living is centred around humans and animals experience of love: nurturing and caring and loving one another.

You can have a fun, enriching and meaningful life without the depth of love that comes when you have found your soul mate sort of course.

But it is a whole other dimension to life that comes when you have found your soulmate that is almost other worldly and then you can finally understand the reason behind practically every love song, love poem, piece of art: and you can finally actually experience every cliche in Mills and Boon type literature!

It is very arrogant to presume just because you have never experienced it that it doesn't exist.