Long relationships a thing of the past???

[Marianne22]

Long as in meet as teens / early 20s until 70s / 80s?

Do people still want the engagement wedding house kids.

My grandparents were married over 60 years.

My parents split when I was 16 probably together 20 years)

Time will tell me and DH have been together 13.

I think with Instagram and Snapchat plus dating apps their are so many opportunities to meet people.

I suspect that the average 18 year old was more mature a couple of generations ago than I was. Partly because there were fewer opportunities (particularly for women) and partly because it was expected. My DDad has a quiet word when I was 21 and said ‘we very much like Dbf but don’t do anything hasty, love.’ I was baffled until I realised that the then bf was 23 and DDad married at 23. Nice lad and we would probably still be married but goodness I’m glad I got more life under my belt first. I wouldn’t have been good for him.

Yes, with instagram FB etc, men are in a sweet shop. Lots more old bastards going after young meat.

Back then people stayed in unhappy relationships because that's what was "proper". Better that we have short happy relationships that live in fear or hate.

I've been with DP 13 years. Met at 19. Probably together forever but sometimes he annoys the shit out of me.

Instagram and Snapchat etc are catalysts not causes of relationships ending - if you (or your partner) are on social media or dating websites looking for other people to chat up then there’s already something wrong in your relationship which you aren’t addressing.

And I’m not sure that looking to people of our grandparents’ and parents’ generations as examples of people who were determined to see their relationships going the distance out of love and commitment is always correct. For some older couples that will have been the case, just as now; for many others the stigma of divorce and lack of financial independence for women will have been influential.

I’m with arethereanyleftatall’s sister on the whole “I promise to love you forever thing*: I wouldn’t promise an employer I’d stay in my job forever even if I really enjoyed it at the time and I wouldn’t promise a friend we’d always be friends because who does that past the age of about 14? Unless you’re religious (and most people aren’t) then marriage vows are no more logical or meaningful than promising your teenage BFF that you’ll always be best friends. I love DP, he makes my life better and I can’t imagine not having him around. I’d like us to remain together for as long as we can both continue to say that about each other. If or when it gets to a point when that’s no longer the case I hope we can each be honest and open enough to go our separate ways and be happy, anyone who’d judge that as a bad thing because the ultimate relationship goal should be to stay together forever no matter what has a weird idea of relationships.

I met dh when I was 18 and he was 23 and have been together 50 years and married for 48. My sister has also been married fo 48 years (we got married 6 weeks apart). One brother has been married for 43 years and another is on his second marriage first marriage 20 years and second 14 years.

My parents were married for one month short of 60 years. I am sure their example could be why we all have such long marriages.

I was in it for the long haul, xh wasn't. You can't control what other people do. I loved him more every year, he backed off more every year (mental health issues). Don't think everyone who's divorced wasn't suited to/very good at marriage.

@ComtesseDeSpair as far as I'm
aware he he hasn't been on a dating site. He doesn't have Instagram or Snapchat. I have Facebook.

Don't assume that just because couples are together from youth to old age that they have been unhappy but stayed together because it was expected! I know many older couples who have had happy marriages and enjoyed their lives together. Of course they would have gone through bad times, but didn't simply bail out at the first sign of trouble as many people do today.

I don't know the answer to your question OP, but find it sad that relationships are seen by some as only temporary stopgaps until someone better comes along.

I'm coming up on our 16th anniversary. While a serious issue like abuse or addiction would be different, for both of us a significant element of being married is the commitment, whatever other changes go on for us personally. We didn't marry as young as people used to though so we'd have to be pretty old to get to our 60th anniversary.

Given the divorce rate is 42%, the majority who marry stay married.

I hope my children marry, as they intend to, are happy and stay together throughout their lives. I hope their children see the benefits of long term committed, stable relationships and understand the value of love above lust.

I find it intersting that people would consider a marriage comparable to a relationship with an employer or anything like that! I see it as a family relationship, so more like a sibling or parent. Promises to love them are from that kind of perspective and not an emotional statement.

DH and I met at 21, we’re now 30 and have been married for four years. I’m in it for the long haul.

My parents have been together for 36 years and are still very happy. My PIL had been together for 30 years when MIL died in 2017 and FIL is heartbroken - they were best friends.

I got together with my ex at 16 and was with him 13 years. I thought it was wonderful that we were each other’s first serious relationship and were going to be together forever.

Didn’t work out that way on account of him being a cheating arse. The break up was devastating and took a long long time to get over because he was my entire adult life and I had no other experiences of breakups to draw on.

Whilst it wasn’t my choice, I am very glad it happened now and happy that I ended up having all these different experiences, new relationships, growing a lot as a person and becoming much more independent. It was a very steep learning curve but one I needed and I far prefer who I am now to who I was in that relationship.

I wouldn’t encourage my child to stick with their first partner and would definitely worry that they were missing out on a lot/ limiting themselves. But I’d be open to being proved wrong too, and of course it can and does work. A good friend of mine is married to the boyfriend she had at school, they’ve been married 14 years now, together 24, and have 3 kids. My sister is 50, she got married at 19 and they’re still together and seem very happy - despite a few bumps in the road. So it can definitely still happen.

My wonderful dad was married to my mother for nearly 45 years when she died. He was unhappy every single moment of the final 30 years of that due to my mothers narcissistic personality. He stayed because of us children and because it wasn't the done thing in his class and age group to leave a marriage.

I met my ex fiancé at 18 at freshers week at uni. We got engaged at the end of our first year and by the time we were in our third year we were renting a flat together rather than a flat share - he was finishing his final year in accountancy and I had another two years of med school.

He started controlling my movements shortly after we moved into the flat and it escalated quickly and shockingly. By the time I finished my degree I was in a full blown abusive relationship and having to go to the next town's A&E almost monthly as I was known at my local hospitals one.

I finally left him after my first year as a junior doctor when he pushed me down some stairs at the hospital where I was working. I was lucky he did it there. Lucky I had to be treated for various broken bones in the hospital where I worked and lucky that a kind, older and more experienced doctor saw through my lies about him.

She got me my PhD project at the other end of the country to get me away from him. And the rest is history.

I have been with my husband for 16 years and married 15. I wish I'd met him at uni. I wish I'd spent those years with him - but at the same time, I know that he is different. He's a high functioning autistic. He's got OCD and being with him is often a challenge - one that I'm not sure I could have coped with when I was younger.

The relationship I have now, my marriage, works because I had the other relationships- the abusive one, the casual ones, the one that got away.....without those relationships and what i learned from them has helped me deal with the challenges of this one.

I didn't meet my DH until we were in our mid-30s so I guess, if we're really lucky, we'll have a maximum of 50 years together.

My parents met in their teens and have been married 50+ years. I think generally things are OK, but TBH, I'm not sure if my dad is glad that they've stayed married. He's said a few things over the years that made me think he wished they'd divorced, but to the outside world, they're a long term love story.

I think people who married in the 1960s generally stayed married (which isn't necessarily a good thing) but with the arrival of equal rights for women in the 1970s, women didn't have to stay in really crap relationships for economic reasons.

I don't think a high divorce rate is a bad thing. I know that wasn't your question, just my musings!

Also it’s not true that divorce rates are increasing every year. They’ve actually come down a fair bit since 2000 (although still around 40%).

Young marriage is a massive risk factor for affairs in late 40s and early 50s. Disclaimer: this is from informal observation rather than scientifically proven.

I've been with my dh since I was 19 and we are early 30s now. I hope we will be together forever, I adore him. That being said, we are both different to the people we were when we first met, luckily despite those differences we still first together, we've grown up together and our core values still match

That should say *fit together

I got married at 21 because I thought it was the right path to take. I was divorced with a child by age 23. I've realised since then that a monogamous traditional relationship isn't what I want in life. I have a very full life with DS, my friends, hobbies and I don't really feel that a relationship would enhance my life. I turn 30 this year and I'm very happy.

I often feel that my way of life is looked down upon - being in a relationship is considered to be the desirable thing, and people just don't believe you when you say that you are happy being single. We are all different.

DH and I met when we were 17, I’m now 34 and we are still going strong.

We’ve changed and grown up together.

I thought I was in it for the long term. My parents have been together 60 years and I thought my relationship was very strong as well.

And yet, within 16 years, it was over. You just never know.

Met at 17 , married at 19 . First child at 21. Divorced at 38 ( different people by then ) Met someone else, been together 21 years, not married. But might this year or next . Still deciding

I'm mid 50's. Surrounded by happily married couples who adore each other. When I divorced a decade ago it surprised me howany adoring husbands tried it on with me and how many adoring wives swiftly droppedevfrom their social diary. I'm very happily married now. But never complacent. Far stronger second marriage for both of us. We chose each other, we didn't settle. Most couples we know are rubbing along at best for the sake of a lifestyle by our age.