We’ve been together for 6 years and have 3 kids aged 6 who he’s been a father to since she was 8months old as her father isn’t around and then together we have a 4 year old and a newborn. I’ve been hinting at him a lot about proposal this year and he’s brought it up and has asked me why I’ve brought it up what has made me think about it and I said well we’ve been with eachother 6 years, have 3 kids and I just want to commit more as I love you. He started going on saying realistically if he was to propose he’d want to get married within a year or two as he doesn’t want to be one of them couples who are engaged for years or just stay engaged permanently without a wedding as your basically just still girlfriend and boyfriend that’s all. He then went on to say how many people realistically would I invite to our wedding not including family (knowing I don’t have a lot of friends and a very small social circle) I said erm 4? And he just said yeah we don’t have alot of people to invite and aswell some of your family members haven’t gotten along in the past like it’s going to be awkward with your mums side of family and your dads side of family there and the same with my family, there’s family members I wouldn’t want to invite as they’ve never even met or said congrats when we’ve had our kids but they’ll act all funny if they hear they haven’t got an invite etc etc…. He then went on to tell me a story about his work mates girlfriend having her 40th birthday not long ago and she’s invited family and family who haven’t seen eachother in a long time and arguments started happening and she had to cancel her birthday party. I kept saying to him were all adults if they don’t like it then who care it’s our day not theirs they should know too leave there shit at the door and not come to a wedding with it. He then said somewhere after you know I only wanna get married once in my lifetime only…
Then he was saying how much do you have in your bank account …. I said £13? At the time I had £13 in my account I hadn’t been paid yet and he laughed and said yeah I don’t have a lot either we’re broke, we need more money especially if we were to get married a year or two after getting engaged and saying he wouldn’t want to get engaged in the UK too he’d want it to be abroad so definitely need loads of money first.
Everytime we’ve had arguments in the past like a few years ago in our relationship a couple of times he would say to me I was going to propose to you this year and saying oh I have the ring at my nans house etc etc…
I don’t know if I’m wasting my time here to be honest…I do want to get married in the future and I do want a proposal and I don’t care how long the engagement is as long as we get married at the end of it, it’ll take a lot of planning to do I just thought maybe after an engagement we save up from then for a wedding but I don’t know I just don’t know if I am wasting my time.
back in December 2018 (before we met), he got engaged to a different ex-girlfriend after only a few months together and then there engagement lasted not long like half year. His mum went absolutely all out for them. She posted a glowing, custom light-up frame on Facebook decorated with butterflies and a silhouette of a man proposing on one knee, writing how incredibly happy she was for them both with tons of love hearts and ring emojis. He even kept photos of her in the beginning of our relationship and the ring on his old phone but claimed he doesn’t go through his photos so didn’t know… he then deleted them after for me as I wasn’t so happy.
When I confront him about this double standard—asking why he could commit to her so quickly but won't propose to me after six years and three kids—he claims it "wasn't a real engagement." He says her parents wouldn’t let him stay over or live there unless he proposed, so he only did it because he "needed a place to stay" and felt forced.
But seeing how publicly celebrated she was by his family, while I am treated like an invisible baby carrier who wasn’t even invited into his mum's house, makes me feel sick to my stomach…. When my 4 year old was born she went over to his mums a lot and up until 3 years old I brought up why I haven’t been invited there and so my partner made her invite so was my first time when she was 3. He says that picture she posted that was only ever one time her and his mum have been in the same room as one another.