How long to wait for marriage?

[Holly2010]

Sorry this is a long read!

I’ve been with DP almost 6 years, living together for 3 years. We’ve discussed marriage and kids, seemed to be on the same page. I love him and our relationship is really good. I just feel we have got too comfortable as things are and we haven’t moved forward.

This past year we’ve been to 4 weddings and he knows I want to get engaged. I’m tired of waiting and I also feel like it’s pointless bringing it up as if he wanted to do it he would 😞 All our friends are married and some have kids, I don’t want to wait ages longer as I worry a lot about fertility. I also have older parents and I want them to still be young enough to have time with grandchildren.

We are in the process of buying a house but we’ve been trying to buy for over a year and two purchases fell through. We had always said let’s get the house first but it’s dragged on and I feel like we aren’t getting anywhere.

I then said I’d like to get engaged soon etc and he seemed on board but that was months ago and still nothing.

I guess what I’m asking is has anyone else been in this situation? What did you do, how long would you wait before you walk away? I’m 30.

I've only read your posts, OP.
You don't wait. You tell him that you would like to be married if you are buying a house together and starting a family, and that you'd like to think that you'll be a mother by age 32.
Get some timeline. If he says 'Not just yet' or 'In a few years' then walk away.

"buying a house together and starting a family," should read "buying a house together and before starting a family,"

Many women wait for a proposal, and in the words of a man I know when he split up from his lovely girlfriend of many years, 'she was a lovely girlfriend but she wasn't a wife'. They split up and both were married to different people within 2 years.

I think this is great advice, I was in his shoes I would certainly be walking away.

Just talk about it, if you can’t communicate then your relationship is doomed proposal or not. make sure contraception is rock solid as well.

I’d sit him down again before progressing with the house. Cards on the table time!

We had the conversation re marriage and kids v early and set an arbitrary date in the future to ‘get engaged’.. in reality he proposed unexpectedly ages beforehand as we knew we wanted to get married, so why wait.

I think if it’s that important to you (it was for me due to family expectations) then you need to be crystal clear and he needs to be honest even if that means a difficult conversation.

Why don't you just approach it more openly in general? My DH is so relaxed he's literally horizontal. He wouldn't have had a clue what sort of ring to buy me or where to start. And he knew I was actually quite particular over what sort of ring I wanted.

We knew we wanted to get married so we just went and chose my ring together. Then he kept it and chose a special time to propose to me (about 10 months later!!). Could something like this work and help him get over the initial hurdle of the getting a ring?

Also, we were childhood sweethearts and were living with my parents when we got engaged AND married. We didn't get our house until not long after marriage. This worked for us because we knew if we got a house first we would pour all our savings into that and never have the wedding we wanted.

I don't think your partner is giving negative signals, if like mine he may just be so chilled and happy where you are at the moment he doesn't really have the umph to get going!

Why do you need a proposal? That's very old fashioned,

Just have a grown up conversation, state marriage is a deal breaker for you and ask if he's willing to set a date?

Marriage is not advised for women who are higher earners or have higher assets so do consider if you'd be putting yourself at risk by marrying.

I have some religious acquaintances who got married before having sexual intercourse, and I can understand why you did.

Nowadays, sex is considered more as a pastime than a physical/spiritual commitment, living together is acceptable, children come along, the mother become a SAHM, house is in the father's name...

For me, whenever I've had this conversation (and been engaged) it's always been assumed that that is what will happen.

I did work with a woman (now in her early 30s) who was getting married and told me she'd been in a relationship for 8-9 years and boyfriend had never proposed. She got upset and put pressure on him but not too much. They ended up getting engaged and then married. I personally would've bailed ages before that, but I am impatient.

Stop being so passive. If you want to be married tell him and see what he says.

There’s nothing good about letting someone else make big decisions for you. You’re 30 FGS not a child.

Marriage, buying a house, having children are all big decisions that deserve sober discussion between two equal adults.

You wouldn’t be sitting patiently waiting for him to decide the two of you are getting a mortgage, you presumably talked about it, picked a time and place and made a plan together. You wouldn’t wait for him to decide it’s time to impregnate you and just go along with it.

Getting married is no different. It’s a decision that’ll affect your whole life, play an equal part in it and don’t cut off your nose to spite your face by playing a helpless Victorian damsel.

So to OP, I'd have a conversation with your SO re marriage but if he stalls, doesn't want to talk etc then I'd consider my future with him.

Yeah, I left the church over right wing hate and bigotry. Nowadays my wife says sex means nothing so I assume it's just a cool thing our bodies do with who is convenient

I don't agree with some posters that 6 years is ridiculously long if you got together fairly young.
DH and I started going out when I was 21, there was no way we were getting married for a few years, eventually did when I was 28.

I do agree though that you shouldn't buy a house or have kids until you are - it sounds old fashioned, but if you're giving him all the benefits of being married without actually having to commit, why would he do it?? There are daily threads on here by women who say they bought a house and had kids, but never "got round to" a wedding, and now they're incredibly vulnerable, legally and financially.

I think instead of setting a deadline in your head, you need to gently have the "shit or get off the pot" conversation - tell him you want kids and to buy a house in the next couple of years, but you're not willing to do that without marriage, so if that's not on the cards he needs to tell you and stop stringing you along.

Just talk to him. DH and I planned the wedding before he had technically proposed because he wanted to do the whole shebang of asking my Dad, getting down on one knee, going away etc. We booked our venue in December, got engaged in March (or got proposed to more accurately), married in September.

I agree that you need to have the discussion. I would not buy a house before you are married - houses chew up money and it makes saving for a wedding much harder.

If he isn’t on the same page then yes I would walk.

Is it possible that after being together for 6 years and living together for 3 of those years, that he no longer sees a need for an engagement or even a big wedding?

Neither of those things are necessary for marriage. Why not suggest a quiet and quick ceremony at a Registry and then a big reception to which all of your family and friends could be invited?

He may feel that he has no desire to be a part of the blushing bride and nervous groom ritual after essentially living for 3 years as a married couple, but he may not be adverse to being married. Only a serious conversation will allow you to know his true feelings on the subject.

If this is someone you would think of spending your life with, why would you ditch him if he does not propose before Valentine's day? That is frankly childish. You have set him a test in your own mind that he knows nothing about, and you are prepared to leave him if he does not pass this test?

You do not have an adult relationship - it is no basis for a lifelong commitment and the raising of children. Sorry to be so blunt, but this is really silly.

If you want a family and are starting to worry about fertility, walking away from someone you currently want to marry because he hasn't got down on one knee yet seems like lunacy!

If marriage before kids is very important to you, then you need to be frank with him. You need to say that you want to start trying for a baby within the next x number of months and that you want to be married before that. Tell him how it is. Tell him your body clock is ticking and you need to know where your relationship is going.

Men don't have the ticking clock that women have, and they'll drag their feet and procrastinate if they are nervous about change so be clear that you are on a timescale. Make sure he knows something is going to have to change in the next year or so - either he marries you and you start trying for a baby, or you split up and go your separate ways. One or the other. His choice but make sure he knows the status quo is not one of the options on the table.

But for goodness' sake, tell him. Don't expect him to just guess.

No, I must admit that it's not something I'd have done either.

Perhaps another chat is in order, a 'nothing else going on' chat, somewhere neutral, when you can ask if he actually, really, wants to marry you as it's feeling very strongly that he doesn't.

You've told him you want to get engaged. That right there is you asking him to marry you. A proposal. Did he say yes or no? That's your answer.

I appreciate that this is not the point of this thread, sorry OP, but why tenants in common and not joint?
I thought that, if you're joint tenants then after death your shares go to the tenant you're joint with and no hassle?

With tenants in common you can skew % ownership to reflect if one person paid a higher deposit for example, you can’t with tenants in common. And yes joint tenants means upon death you share goes to the other person, but if you are not married maybe you don’t want that to happen and would rather it went to parents, siblings, children. Damn sure I wouldn’t want all my worldly goods to go to a man that would not marry me, but then I wouldn’t have bought a house with them in the first place either.

This. I'm afraid.

*can’t with joint tenants I mean.

You need to have a grown up conversation about what is important to each of you - owning a home, marriage, wedding, children. You mention his parents are divorced, maybe he doesn’t therefore place the same importance on marriage as you do when you have agreed to buy a house together for example?
As others have said, if you love him you can’t set an imaginary deadline in your head for him to propose, then walk away if it isn’t met.