AIBU to feel shocked my 23-year-old daughter is marrying?

[SlothsRUs]

My 23 year old daughter has just announced that she is getting married next year.

I am completely shocked.

Surely it’s not normal anymore to marry that early.

I tried to be joyous and congratulate her but would you be happy?

I want to know why she wants to marry this young.

I know she is an adult and what she does is nothing to do with me but I am really shocked.

Both of my DS met their partners aged 16. DS1 is now 31 and has been married for three years. They wanted to be married before they had DC. DGC has just had her first birthday.
DS2 is 22. I would be shocked if he proposed anytime soon.
I was married at 23 and am still happily married. Whilst I would not say anything, I think 23 is very young to today, especially given (I think) the divorce rate of higher than 50%.
I wonder what percentage of those agreeing with DD are still with their DH if they married at that age or younger?

I think its young for this day and age .However if he seems nice thats a positive surely.While more fashionable to be single ,everyone will have a different persepective .Be happy for her is all

I don’t understand what one thing has to do with the other. Not every 23 year old living at home is without a job and acting like a teenager. And not every 23 year old getting married has their shit together.
Anyway I want my DD to go out and have adventures at 23. Pretty much everything that @NoctuaAthene said which I’m too hot to hot to repeat.

I really don’t see the issue here? I married at 21, but I really wanted to do life stuff, so had 1st child 12 years later. Me & H had a blast!

We were 22, and we've been together over 30 years.

I think it's quite different marrying at that age, as you aren't yet established in adult life. In some ways that makes it much easier, as you are navigating together from the outset, rather than coming together with different habits and expectations already there, needing to adjust to each other.

It's less common now because it is not just accepted, but expected, that couples live together before getting married. If we'd had mumsnet forty years ago, people would have been on here worrying that their daughter was moving in with someone without at least being engaged.

Her brain is still developing,

Oh for goodness sake. Not this again.
This is exactly what I mean about this generation of adults being infantilised. A bit of research was totally misunderstood by the public and is constantly wheeled out to justify treating grown adults like children.

For the record, our brains continue to develop throughout our lives.

23 is young to be married nowadays.
I would be secretly a bit gutted if this was my DC.

However, a marriage isn’t a death sentence.

She can still live her life to the fullest whilst bringing married.

I would be happy that she’s found a nice partner and is doing something that makes her happy, instead of feeling pressured into following in her friends footsteps.

She sounds like she has her head screwed on so I would trust her that she knows what she’s doing.

Go along for the ride and share in her happiness and fun.

I'd feel the same as you OP - by today's standards it is very young, you haven't had much opportunity to explore the big wide world by that age. I note that most of those saying they did this were quite some time ago when things were different. And for all those saying it worked out, you could certainly point to at least an equal amount, if not more, for whom it didn't.

On the other hand, not everyone wants to explore what's out there as much as others, it depends what kind of life you want to lead, and she is an adult and it is ultimately her decision. So I would have my misgivings, but keep them to myself, if it were me.

Whether or not you think this is “normal” or not to a large part depends on your social circles, however I would personally consider it quite young still.

I got married at 25 which wasn’t unusual then. However it is probably the biggest regret of my life as the marriage was abusive and it has caused no end of suffering even now 2 decades on for myself and for our child (I got pregnant at 27). In my case I think if I’d married someone genuine and not someone pretending to be someone he wasn’t, it would likely have worked well as I was very serious about the commitment.

So age wasn’t the problem in one sense, his abusive nature was. However I think I’d have been more likely to spot the red flags as they were happening and less prepares to put up with things and have more confidence if I had married even a few years later on.

I also regret getting engaged within a year and married by 18 months. I think you need more than 18 months to make sure you’ve seen all sides to someone, and we were also long distance at the time so actually in retrospect it would have been good to allow it more time then I might have clocked on to the coercive control dynamic. Young people these days are so much more educated about that side of things though. But even so, if shes not in a rush for children then in your shoes I think I’d express that this is great news (as you seem to think the guy is decent and shes known him fairly long now), but maybe just quietly encourage her to have a long engagement. Perhaps that’s what shes planning anyway?

Also for the poster who thinks 23 is “fucking nuts”…. Some people would rather have the freedom of their children flying the nest when they’re 43, than be 43 with a toddler or primary-aged child.

Some people might think waiting til you’re mid-late 30s to settle down (when fewer good men your age are still single…) is “fucking nuts”. We are all different.

And there’s no evidence that people who marry in their 30s or 40s have a better divorce record. I would speculate there’s more baggage and issues, and people more
set in their ways, leaving it that late.

I married young i certainly didn't think I would be "on the shelf" if I didn't marry my husband who i have been with 36 years , i got married in the 1990s not the 18 90s

I appreciate some people won't marry as young but we need to stop infantising grown women.

I don't think its particularly young. I got married at 26 but didn't meet my DH until 22. If I'd have met him earlier, I wouldn't have though we were too young to marry earlier than that.

2 years together was about average in my friendship group to get engage. Most then had 18 month engagements. Most of us were 25-26 when married. Your 23 year old DD will be 24 next year so it isnt far off that.

I got married at 23 but divorced.
Married again at 51.
Looking back I think I was too young.
However there is nothing you can do but hope for the best and wish them well.

I met DH at 17 married at 19.
Fast forward to September and it will be our 47th wedding anniversary.

Hopefully she has found the one that makes her happy.

Well I'm not sure that's exactly true. Of course lots of relationships formed in the 30s and 40s fail too, and I do think there is a bit of a phenomenon of people desperate to settle and have kids at that kind of age who 'settle' for imperfect relationships which may then break down later. But at least the slightly older people have the benefit of being a bit more life experienced and settled on a life trajectory.

But my main point is that the benefits of marriage (such as they are, and like I say I'm a skeptic in general) are much more applicable to older, more financially well off couples, but the downsides are universal. The legal benefits of marriage relate to the sharing of the assets and the protection of the financially less well off partner, usually the woman who has sacrificed career and earning potential to raise children. And there's a certain amount around death-admin and inheritance tax benefits.

I would say for an early 20s couple, even given a precisely similar risk of a relationship breakdown and a short marriage compared to an early 30s or 40s couple, the likely outcome of a divorce would be they each walk away with basically nothing or what they brought into the marriage, given they likely don't have high salaries in the first place so neither would have to pay much by way of maintenance to the other, and they probably don't have any or many assets they need to arrange division of. Even if they have kids and the woman gave up work to raise them (which isn't usual amongst young couples of my acquaintance), the court would probably expect that she would return to work or support herself in some way with maintenance from the dad similar to the basic CMS calculations, where there isn't much money to divide the court can hardly magic funds from nowhere, so that she can continue to live the same lifestyle as before divorce. And certainly you wouldn't think it's likely one of them will die with an estate over the inheritance tax threshold? Whereas older couples do have all these considerations to take into account...

I married at 23. Met hubby aged 18. Now 45 still happily married with 2 kids. We spent the first 8 years travelling and loving life. It can work.

I’d focus on the fact she’s happy, he’s a nice guy and they’ve been together 2.5 years. They aren’t rushing things, wedding next year she’ll be 24 and been together 3.5 years.
It’s young in modern context but not ridiculously so.

Tell her congratulations there I fixed it for you

@TheSquareMile Oh God no! Family money.

I have not expressed disappointment but surprise. When the dust is settled I want my husband to ask her a few questions (I don’t want to have the conversation as she will accuse me of being dramatic) re: money, inheritance etc.

She and my youngest daughter have been supported by my MiL during the last few years at uni.

She and my youngest daughter will also inherit from my MiL instead of my husband -long story.

I want her to be crystal clear that she has to be independent financially as marriage is a legal contract. This has to come from my husband as she would just shout at me and say I was being dramatic.

I'm amazed at some of the responses on here. I know that MN as a whole can be horrified at some quite everyday stuff (people using toilets to poo in is probably the weirdest of all); but this is bonkers.

The very idea that your fully-adult DD has given you the news that she's found a man whom she hopes and believes will be her lifelong partner, the father to their children in their secure family set-up, and her companion to grow old with... and your reaction is shock, disappointment, devastation, concern, fear and foreboding!

Yes, marriages often fail; but they also often succeed amazingly - and either eventuality can be true of people who marry at any stage in their adult lives.

The way some people react, maybe we should just tell everybody to wait until they're 85 before they marry - so as to drastically reduce the time available for marriages to be able to fail before widowhood!!

Wow, you're gutted she has fallen in love and they want to build a stable life together... It's a lovely thing to celebrate. They can pool their resources and support one another through their early careers, climbing the property ladder, travelling pre-kids etc. Amazing stage of their lives.

Marriages fail at all sorts of ages for all sorts of reasons. You really can't blame their age (when they are fully grown adults!)

Id be worried if my dc was planning kids without being financially stable but it sounds like thats not the case here?

Shes an adult, who has met the man she wants to marry, its fine!

I wish her luck and hope she’s very happy! I’m glad I didn’t marry my boyfriend at 23, he was my second love and I didn’t know anything about relationships. Some religious school friends married in early 20s and are now separated, I only have one married friend my age at 35. But Millie Bobby Brown got married at 20 so maybe the trend is back. I wish them the best, finding my “person” that young would’ve saved me a lot of heartache!