if 1 of you wants to marry and the other doesnt what do you do?

daska

Lotus-eater wrote: »

I suspect I am a little tired of hearing that the only way I can be a proper partner to my OH and a proper dad to my kids, is by being married.

LOL

Being married doesn't make you a proper partner or a proper parent - only the way you behave can make you that.

However, some people go into relationships without any real intention of being a proper partner or parent and marriage protects the weaker party. Obviously this isn't you.

Mely

brians_daughter wrote: »

one of the girls where i work is in this dilema, and truely doesnt know what to do! We have given our opinion so thought we would throw it out to the lovely MSE crowd to see what they think

Her and her oh have been together 10 years and have 2 kids. She has always made it clear she wants to get engaged and get married, her oh promised her they would 'one day'.

She sat him down last week and said its marriage, as he promised or she is out of there. Basically an ultimatum. They have had this discussion a number of times over the years but he has always had good reason to not get engaged or plan a wedding.

They are good reasons he has given IMOA such as they moved house, so he said they would get the house straight then look at rings and marriage. Then 18 months later she got pregnant (planned) and she brought the subject up again, her oh said lets wait til baby is born then re-assess things £s worries etc with new baby.

Now things are more 'steady' ie no house moves or baby plans so shes brough it up again last week, hes said he doesnt want to get married as he doesnt believe in it and wont get engaged as he thinks if you are engaged you should be planning to get married!

She has thrown her hat in the ring and said she would give him 7 days to figure things out but she would consider leaving - not just because he wont marry her but she feels lied to as he has, in her words 'strung her along' all this time. She has said if she knew he never intended to marry she would never have bought a house with him or had kids. One of her main 'arguments' in all this is the kids have his surname, she wanted them to have hers and change it when they married, but he talked her round to having his and promised her by the time the kids started school they would be married, its important to her that they all have the same surname (i suggested chaging hers by deedpole if it was the name issue) but she says its more than that - she wants to marry.

we have all given our opinions but i thought i would throw it to the lovely lot on MSE to give opinions as well.

IMOA i can see her point, but if it is a loving relationship (which it is) it seems almost 'silly' to throw 10 years down the drain, not to mention breaking up the kiddies home - not that i would expect her to stay for the sake of the kids iykwim??

If she had waited untill after she got married then she wouldnt have ended up with a child and a partner that doesnt want to marry her. A classic case of putting the cart before the horse lol. She is only thinking about herself and not the child in wanting to split from her partner because he wont marry her! What effect would this have on the child? She has made her bed and she should lie in it - people walk away far too easily from relationships these days!

seven-day-weekend

cathy2702 wrote: »

:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j

Love this idea - I would love that

Romantic, isn't it??

JBD

seven-day-weekend wrote: »

If what the OP has said is accurate, I don't think he wants to marry HER. I think he has fobbed her off with excuses all these years and his reluctance now is nothing to do with not agreeing with marriage per se, it is to do with marrying her. He doesn't want to and isn't going to. He does not love her enough.

I appreciate that we only have what the OP says to go on; on these assumptions this is what I see.

I don't really get this. How can you love someone enough to live with themfor 10 years, buy a house together and have 2 children with, but not love them enough to marry them?. What else exactly is there?.It seems as if some people think they are entitled to some sort of ideal partner ie 'the one' and in the meantime they will live with another partner. It must make this girl feel as if she is a temporary partner until something better comes along.Not quite good enough.

Bambywamby

A friend of mine nattered her man for five years to get married...he stalled and excused himself with nonsense reasons...it was only when she had given up on getting wed and hadn't mentioned it for 5 months that he popped the question.
When she asked him why he didn't want to get married before - he replied "It wasn't that I didn't want to get married, we had such a good thing going...I didn't want anything to spoil it...marriage can change people...but after a few months of you not seeming so bothered about marriage and you became more relaxed about the whole thing I thought...nothing bad will happen if we get married...this girl will stay chilled and happy throughout...wow I want to marry her."
And now they are happily married.

Men can be quite deep and it isn't always for comittment shy reasons that they are wary of marriage. Having children and sharing a stonking mortgage is more of a commitment anyway.
Maybe she should lighten up and enjoy what she has.

euronorris

Bambywamby - you raise a very good point. My brother put off asking his wife to marry him for quite some time, ONLY because she was so insistant about it.
He didn't want to do it under so much pressure, as he couldn't then be sure it was what he wanted, only what she wanted.

After a while she stopped mentioning it, and then he was able to think clearly. He popped the question only a month or so later (he'd been saving the entire time).

And, he also wanted it to be a SURPRISE. And, until she stopped nagging, it could never be a surprise.

Anyway, they're happily married now.

seven-day-weekend

JBD wrote: »

I don't really get this. How can you love someone enough to live with themfor 10 years, buy a house together and have 2 children with, but not love them enough to marry them?. What else exactly is there?.It seems as if some people think they are entitled to some sort of ideal partner ie 'the one' and in the meantime they will live with another partner. It must make this girl feel as if she is a temporary partner until something better comes along.Not quite good enough.

Yes, this is exactly what I think the scenario may be. I would certainly feel that he thought I wasn't good enough under those circumstances.

Katie-Kat-Kins

RobertoMoir wrote: »

Of course we don't know, the problem might be that when the OP's friend says "marriage" they mean the kind of ceremony that makes the average royal family marriage at Westminster Abbey seem like a quiet anonymous get-together for a few close friends in comparison. It may be that their partner isn't objecting to the bit of paper but to the big ceremony that maybe the OP's friend is insisting they want, which is a legitimate objection imho... We just don't know.


Absolutely.

That is why they need to talk about why he doesn't want to marry. I did some research on anxiety disorder and social phobia a while back and read a truely heart breaking account by a man who had almost split up with his girlfriend because he refused to marry her. He desparately wanted to marry her but the thought of saying the vows in front of other people terrified him.

That is an extreme example but a small ceremony or eloping might be ok with this guy if it is the cost/faff/being the centre of attention that is bothering him.

People have all sorts of funny ideas about marriage (how many people on here seem to think, wrongly, that there is an automatic right to 50% of everything upon divorce) and until you discuss the concerns you don't know whether they can be overcome.

Lotus-eater

Katie-Kat-Kins wrote: »

That is why they need to talk about why he doesn't want to marry. I did some research on anxiety disorder and social phobia a while back and read a truely heart breaking account by a man who had almost split up with his girlfriend because he refused to marry her. He desparately wanted to marry her but the thought of saying the vows in front of other people terrified him.

That is an extreme example

I don't think that's as extreme or unusual as you seem to think it is.

I've known a couple of people like that in real life, in web life I've known a few as well.

JBD

Lotus-eater wrote: »

I don't think that's as extreme or unusual as you seem to think it is.

I've known a couple of people like that in real life, in web life I've known a few as well.

I was a little like this. We had a low key registry office wedding, although we had guests there it is possible to do it with just 2 witnesses who could just be strangers.I certainly would never have been able to do the walking down the aisle thing with everyone turning round to stare at me. Surely though if this is an issue for this man then he should at least let his partner know.