Boyfriend felt pressured by ring shopping discussion

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Both in our early to mid 30s so I thought a year and a half is plenty of time to be engaged for our age. We are also living together now. We have discussed marriage and kids and I mentioned that I would not like to be together for more than 2 years and still don’t have a solution plan if we would get married. He seemed to be ok with the timeline but he never actively brought up the timeline convo again. I recently started to look at rings and I never try one on before. My friend who just got married recently has been encouraging me to at least start looking and it would take time to find something I like anyways so I should start looking for fun. I expressed to my bf that we should maybe go ring shopping together. He seemed ok to it at first. Today he finally mentioned that I am pressuring him and that I had been talking about it too much. Maybe I had been but I was just excited for the future and the fact that a few of my friends just got married recently made me feel the highs of being engaged. I freaked out and asked what he meant and he said he didn’t mean it in a negative way.
Now my head is all over the place. We had been talking about marriage for a while and he even wrote down the different shapes and cuts of rings that I came across on the Internet. I thought we were on the right direction. I had told him that I just wanted to do ring shopping for fun and did not expect this reaction.
Now I don’t want to even think about marrying him anymore. The relationship has been very good otherwise and he has genuinely been a good partner to me and his family is amazing to me.
Am I being dramatic? I feel dramatic because as the words came out of his mouth, my tears just wouldn’t stop dropping I had to take a cold shower to calm myself down. I can’t quite fantom whether it was the shame of me even asking to go for ring shopping or the fact that someone who I thought loved me would even feel pressured by ring shopping talk.

Shopping for rings means you’re intending to marry, and are therefore engaged.

This is only sensible advice when the woman is financially vulnerable though. When the man owns the house and/or the woman is going part time and losing out on savings and pensions.

If the house belongs to the woman or it’s jointly owned, and she remains full time earning the same as him, it’s not important.

It can become important if the child is born with additional needs or an illness or disability that requires more care than anticipated. Many parents of children with SN - and it’s usually the mothers - end up as SAHP even though that was never their plan.

It feels a little intense to me so I can see why he felt pressured.

Given the firm ideas the OP has for the ring shopping I suspect that if he did propose we would see another post about how the proposal wasn’t what she thought it should be. And another cold shower would be required.
Go with the flow, not everything has to be stage managed. If you feel he isn’t committed directly ask the question and if he says he does but he wants to relax then either step back or break it off.

I feel dramatic because as the words came out of his mouth, my tears just wouldn’t stop dropping I had to take a cold shower to calm myself down. I can’t quite fantom whether it was the shame of me even asking to go for ring shopping or the fact that someone who I thought loved me would even feel pressured by ring shopping talk.

Yes, that is very dramatic. If my son had told me this is how his girlfriend reacted to him telling her he wasn't ready to get engaged/married, I would suggest he takes a long think about whether this was the right person for him.

I’ve heard of using a shower being recommended to distract if you’re overwhelmed with emotions. I worked with a psychiatrist who said the physical sensation refocuses your mind away from your thoughts, helping you to calm down. They didn’t say anything about temperature but I guess cold would intensify that maybe?

OP I’ve only read your original message. He’s not proposed to you right? You’ve given him a time line, you’ve said you have gone ring shopping? Listen, if he wanted to marry you he would be on one knee. Listen to what he’s telling you….

Agree with the changing names.
35 years ago I didn't change mine, never considered it for a moment.

In my circles the mid 30's are marrying peers, no great disparity in finances, just young professionals committing to each other before they have children.

Obviously if there is huge disparity and people are older then it might indeed make sense for women to sometimes hold off.

But in the main, having children is a far greater commitment IMO than buying a house or marrying.

So if a man is not prepared to marry a woman, when it is wise to do so to protect the woman.....then only very foolish women put themselves at risk by doing so.

It maybe old fashioned for some but as someone who is financially astute, for the majority of women having children is best with the limited protections of marriage.

Only women with the lowest of self worth insist on having children with a man whom they want to marry, but he has refused to do so.

loads of people move in and have children without being engaged. it's definitely not "only on MN"

and lots of people don't want a church wedding. we had a handfasting in a stone circle, the legal bit after by an underground lake lit by candles, and then a garden party reception.

someone did once ask what church we were getting married at, and I couldn't stop laughing. neither of us are Christians. I'm Pagan, he's vagely "there might be something, there might not" so there's no reason we were even going to consider it.