“I love it when people get themselves in a twist about a poster not returning. It's like they can't compute that people have lives beyond mumsnet. ?I'm thinking that one of the reasons that she hasn't come back is because she gets engaged, and dozens of posters piss all over it.”
In the time I’ve been drafting a response, the above was posted, which I think pretty much sums up exactly why I’ve taken my time to reply!
I’m really grateful to everyone who has taken the time to post with the intention of helping me. I never expected this thread to get so big and I wanted to make sure I’d read all the posts before responding. While taking all opinions on board, I have felt at times that I’m damned if I do and I’m damned if I don’t.
For example - when I responded more to the comments that resonated with my situation the most, I was accused of being in denial about the harsher ones. (Ie: this man will NEVER marry you or have kids with you) When I took a break from responding (to celebrate my engagement) I return to the thread to find that my silence has been interpreted as me falsifying the truth.
I shall try my best to address some of the comments – with any luck I’ll be able to clarify a few things.
I don't expect strangers to share the joy of my engagement, but to have it insinuated that the ring is imagined / fake / I asked for a baby and got a piece of metal, etc is way off the mark. You may not know me, but I am real and so is my engagement. I wonder how many of you would say to someone in RL who had just got engaged that:
The ring is a gesture to “shut me up”
“An engagement really means so very, very little in terms of commitment.”
“Engagement is a bit meh.”
Each to their own, but engagement is a huge deal to me and equally to my DF – if he wanted to “shut me up” he could have done so a long time ago!
“You may have a confirmed bachelor on your hands (perhaps why he cried when he gave you the ring?)
He didn’t cry when he gave me the ring - the proposal occurred several hours later. I certainly wouldn’t have accepted a ring from a blubbering wreck!
“Why the hell was he crying during the conversation? Surely you hadn't raised any points you hadn't raised before...Sounds extremely manipulative to me. ?Tears and a ring, to get you to back away from the main issue.”
He cried when I reiterated MN suggestions that he was just not that into me / didn’t 100% intend to marry me. I hadn’t raised this before because it honestly wasn’t in my head. He was upset to think that I was hurting because of this misconception.
”No-one on the Internet can tell you how he feels only him”
I posted on MN to get objective opinions. For the most part I’ve had wise and helpful feedback. I’ve thought long and hard when some posters have said I’m in denial about some things. I’m no fool and don’t wish to enter into anything blindly.
I tried to paint as accurate a picture of the situation as I could to get the best advice possible – perhaps I have failed at times which has led to assumptions about my DF which simply aren’t true. I think it’s also fair to say there’s been a lot of projection on this thread and I now feel very sad that I even entertained some of the most negative suggestions about DF – they’re simply not true and have somewhat overshadowed what should be a positive step forward.
“Can I ask-has the OP said anywhere that she won't have a baby without being married? If not- why all the fuss about weddings? If she's not bothered, then obviously the proposal/engagement/wedding schtick is just another stalling/controlling tactic”
I think some posters may have got confused when I wrote: “His commitment around marriage is less of an issue to me than the question of starting a family.”
By this I meant I was far surer of his intention to marry me than his intention to start trying for a family soon NOT that getting married is a less immediate priority for me than than TTC.
I am sure they both want to start trying after marriage, not before, like most traditional couples.
To clarify, marriage is extremely important to me. I always intended to wed before I have kids, and not for the sake of a wedding but for the marriage itself. (Cue the comments about it not being the 1950s but I don't feel the need to justify this.)
After much discussion over the past three days we are looking to book our wedding in the October half term holidays. An inexpensive affair with family and close friends, most likely with a reception in the village hall.
“He produces a ring, and she's supposed to shout 'That's all very well, but I want a baby! GIVE ME YOUR SPERM NOW!' Hey presto, bloke feels like nothing more than a sperm donor and is crushed.”
This completely resonates with me. As I mentioned upthread:
“If it wasn't for my fertility, I wouldn't be in any massive rush to have kids now either.”
I can totally understand that at my age I don’t have the luxury of time and I’m not posting this making out that everything has been resolved because it hasn’t – we still need to have the talk about when we ditch the condoms, but I definitely see this as a step forward – Rome wasn’t built in a day. Tomorrow morning I’ll be booking a fertility test and then we’ll see where we go from there.