Deciding When to Get Married

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verdantmemories

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My boyfriend and I definitely want to get married, but we’re trying to decide between two years from now and four years. In two years, I’ll be transferring to college in his town, and it would be convenient to be able to live at home instead of paying room and board, not to mention it would just be nice to be married to him 🙂 In four years, however, I will be done with school, but we will have been dating for five years and that’s a long time to wait. We’ve run the numbers, and financially we should be able to handle it in two years or four years, so that’s not an issue.

Honestly, what’s your opinion on this?
 
How important is it for you to finish school on schedule? If you should marry before graduation and children come soon, you may need to reduce or completely defer your schooling for a while.
 
verdantmemories said:
My boyfriend and I definitely want to get married, but we’re trying to decide between two years from now and four years. In two years, I’ll be transferring to college in his town, and it would be convenient to be able to live at home instead of paying room and board, not to mention it would just be nice to be married to him 🙂 In four years, however, I will be done with school, but we will have been dating for five years and that’s a long time to wait. We’ve run the numbers, and financially we should be able to handle it in two years or four years, so that’s not an issue.

Honestly, what’s your opinion on this?
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You get married when you decide that you are willing to forsake all others, know that your married till death, you get married when your mature enough to know that God decides if you will have children and how many, You get married when you can pay your way, You get married when you can march through hell for a heavenly cause… I wish you peace and a happy and joyus marriage… good luck, Lord knows you will need it if you marry even for the right reasons. Feel better?😃
 
Well, that’s why I’m unsure, I want to be mature enough for all that, but I don’t know how to tell if my maturity is at the proper level 😛
 
verdantmemories said:
Well, that’s why I’m unsure, I want to be mature enough for all that, but I don’t know how to tell if my maturity is at the proper level 😛
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…as hard as this will be to understand…when you reach that maturity, you won’t be coming to CA to ask. Give it time. May the Love of God go with you, I wish you Peace…
 
I agree with Scar…when you are mature enough, yu will know and won’t need a Forum to weigh in on the decision! I know that is not an “answer”…and as Scar also said, you won’t want to do anything else BUT get married! You will want the marriage (notice I did not say you will want the WEDDING!) more than anything else in your life. I got married at a very young age and everyone told us it would never last and that we were too young. Well, chronologically we were, but we both knew we were ready for the challenges we would face. And here we are, 37 years and still in love!

Prayers are with you and your beloved!
 
Scar said:
You get married when you decide that you are willing to forsake all others, know that your married till death, you get married when your mature enough to know that God decides if you will have children and how many, You get married when you can pay your way, You get married when you can march through hell for a heavenly cause… I wish you peace and a happy and joyus marriage… good luck, Lord knows you will need it if you marry even for the right reasons. Feel better?😃
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good post.
 
I recently got married after a two year engagement. We dated for a total of five years including the engagement. I found that our two year engagement was a very very long time. I would not recommend a longer one. But it’s a personal decision of course!
-mike
 
I am not Catholic, but I do know how it feels to be in love and waiting for the “right time”. My husband and I met in college and dated for 3 1/2 years before getting engaged…our engagement was 1 1/2 years… I personaly felt that this was a very comfortable amount of time to date…As far as the engagement period…everyone will say something different, but I personaly felt so overwelmed with plans and decisions…even with a wedding coordinator. You need to think about what feels right for you…if you are not sure about being mature enough for marriage, then maybe it is in your and his best interest to wait a while. I can’t help but notice your remark about how it would be it would be “more convenient to be able to live at home instead of paying room and board”. I don’t wan’t to sound rude, but marriage is not about “conveniece”…its about giving your life to somebody and supporting them through what ever life deals you. I wish you the best of luck, and while I am by no means an expert, I would ask you to seriously rethink your plans.
 
How old are you? I am guessing 18-20? Honestly? I think you are too young to really think too much about marriage.
 
Age is relative to your maturity level, but I did not learn until after I married my wife that I “was” mature enough to get married. I was a little worried about it, but I knew I’d do whatever it took, no matter what. Make sure you both have that same mentality.

Also, you have to learn to bite your tounge, walk away and cool down. That you will fight no matter what, but to pick your fights and make sure they are just. And that the honeymoon stage is exactly that, a stage…it comes and goes. People who have been married for 20 years still go through honeymoon stages. So when it fades after the first couple years or so, accept it and wait for it to come back around. When you both understand that you will be happily married your whole life.

One other thing, get Dave Ramsey’s books, go to his web site, listen to his radio show and if you want take his class Financial Peace University. If you apply his methods, money will not be an issue in your marriage. It has made a big difference in mine.
 
Is there any necessity for you to decide now when you will get married? Why not date for another year and then bring up the topic again? Why not get married in three years? There isn’t any need to choose years in advance between potential dates years away.

I think that being engaged for more than a year would probably be a trial, so I wouldn’t advise it. Our engagement is going to be 8 months (five of those months are passed), and it seems long even so. Why not get engaged when you believe you’re ready, instead of trying to figure out now when you will be ready?
 
  1. Marriage is really hard work - look at the failure rate and you’ll see that it must be (as opposed to mushy love movies etc!).
  2. How able to resist temptation are you ? If you’re tempted into doing the wrong thing, better to get married sooner rather than later.
  3. Marriage is for a LONG time. Especially if you have babies early (which you probably will if you follow the Church’s teaching properly), you won’t be able to do lots of the things that your friends at similar ages are doing eg. travelling overseas, partying to the early hours etc.
  4. Everyone changes as they get older and what we look for in our spouse as a young person if often quite different to what you want as you age a little. eg. Looks vs housework! And even if he’s good at housework now, that could wear off as he ages!
  5. Gloom and doom ? No, but I was engaged at 18 and we broke up within about 6 mths. I engaged again at 21 and married 6mths after that (we were certainly tempted), had Baby A at 22 etc and I don’t regret it but we have both changed lots and it has been hard work at times and I did have to watch my friends doing lots of cool things I couldn’t (and excluding us 'cos we weren’t single anymore).
Think it through very carefully and don’t rush into anything so important. BTW, my first fiance turned out (now) to be a bit of a jerk!
 
Sina said:
How old are you? I am guessing 18-20? Honestly? I think you are too young to really think too much about marriage.
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I don’t think age is the issue. As Scar said- its maturity. Some thought my wife and I were “too young” (23 & 20). Just because you are advanced in age, does not mean you are ready to be married some who are younger, go on to have a long and blessed marriage.

You will “know” when the time is right. God has a way of doing that. Be wary of getting married for financial reasons or convenience. Marriage is a lifelong vocation that takes careful discernment. What I can tell you is to pray about it- alot!
 
Alright, so I’m coming back to this post a few months later. There is no longer any doubt in my mind that I’m ready, that he’s ready, that we can make it work spiritually and financially. However, now that we’re getting engaged, my parents are very against a wedding before we graduate college. Does this fall into the category of “honor thy father and mother” or should we respectfully go ahead with our current plan?
 
Scar said:
You get married when you decide that you are willing to forsake all others, know that your married till death, you get married when your mature enough to know that God decides if you will have children and how many, You get married when you can pay your way, You get married when you can march through hell for a heavenly cause… I wish you peace and a happy and joyus marriage… good luck, Lord knows you will need it if you marry even for the right reasons. Feel better?😃
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I’m all those things…
Now I just need to find a man willing to marry me. boom tish Thank you, don’t forget to tip your waiter, I’ll be here all week! 😉
 
verdantmemories said:
Alright, so I’m coming back to this post a few months later. There is no longer any doubt in my mind that I’m ready, that he’s ready, that we can make it work spiritually and financially. However, now that we’re getting engaged, my parents are very against a wedding before we graduate college. Does this fall into the category of “honor thy father and mother” or should we respectfully go ahead with our current plan?
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You can “honor” your parents without letting them dictate your schedule. If they advise you not to do something, ask them why. Respect their opinions enough to seriously consider them. If you decide not to follow their advice, respectfully THANK THEM for their wisdom, then patiently explain to them why you’ve decided to do something against their advice.

(But don’t be shocked if they offer little to no financial assistance with the wedding planning. But you said you’re financially ready to make it work, so you probably don’t need their money anyway.)

Also: congrats on the engagement. 🙂
 
Augusta_Sans said:
(But don’t be shocked if they offer little to no financial assistance with the wedding planning. But you said you’re financially ready to make it work, so you probably don’t need their money anyway.)

Also: congrats on the engagement. 🙂
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Thanks! The way we figure it, if we need parental assistance for the wedding, we’re paying too much 😉 We’re all for having a fiscally responsible wedding with inexpensive food and a cheap reception. It’s all about the people who come, right? 🙂
 
I’m not sure if this helps, but seeing as how I don’t truly know all of the dynamics in your situation, maybe sharing my personal experience will help.

I fell in love with my husband while we both were still in college. We had a year left of school but both of us wanted to go on to graduate school! :eek: We dated for three years and did not get married until a week after my husband’s last day of classes. Being married is 5bajillion times better than dating, but looking back, I believe that we made the right decision. We knew that we were going to be together forever, so prioritizing and finishing college and graduate school first was a great way to start our married life together because we could focus a lot of energy on each other and our life together ahead without cramming for finals. My parents strongly encouraged me to finish school at least before getting married, especially for the case of if I became pregnant. When we start a family, I want to be able to focus all of my energy on that as well. I am thankful for my education as a backup in case something ever happens to my husband. He is actually thinking about going back to school now to get his PhD. 🙂 Like I said, I don’t know your situation exactly, but for me, and as a woman, I am very happy that I finished school first for myself and as insurance for my family.
 
Thanks for your response, Stella! School is definitely top priority for both of us, as well, but we don’t see why school and marriage shouldn’t be able to coexist. We’re definitely not planning on dropping our education once we get married; we would continue until we both got our degrees.
 
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