Weddingbee boards

Not to beat a dead horse....but I found this blog and thought I would throw my hat in the ring of solidarity here! I'm really glad this site exists - it's nice to know that I'm not the only one out there!

My bf and I have been together for 3+ plus years (coming up on 4 in November), and living together for 2. I always rolled my eyes whenever I heard the "I just knew" reponse whenever someone asked how someone knew her man was the one. Sure enough, just after a month of dating, it hit me: I just "felt it" - this guy was it for me. As a couple, we have never been the type to really discuss our relationship - things have always just happened. After about 3 months together, we were out with some of his friends and one of his friends referred to me as as my man's "girlfriend." So that answered that question :). However, as our relationship has taken it's course, we have yet to have a real discussion about our future. Like most relationships, ours has not been wine and roses all the time, but I have been very happy. I believe there is an unspoken assumption that we will get married. Although we have never discussed it, there have been jokes and comments made in passing. For example, one evening we went to an NBA game, and I made a comment about how lame I thought it was for someone to propose via a text message and have posted on a jumbotron at a professional sporting event (which we had just witnessed). He responded in jest by saying "So much for my idea! E-mail it is!"

Like many of you out there, as the years have gone by, I have witnessed all of my friends get married off one by one, most of them to guys or girls who they had been with less time than us. He is the oldest of 3, and both of his younger sisters are married. I spent lots of time with his family and I truly love them and I know they are as antsy as I am. One evening this spring we were out to dinner with his parents and a couple of their friends, and we were discussing parents showing embarrassing pictures of their kids to significant others. I remarked that I had seen some pretty embarrassing photos of my bf, and his dad leaned over to me and said "We're saving the really embarrassing ones for the wedding." Which of course took me off guard a bit - I'm glad his family got the memo, because I sure haven't! One of his sisters even told me they were all expecting it to happen last November when everyone was in town for this 30th birthday. But it didn't.

And yet, we still haven't talked about getting married! His only recent indication was in passing when I was telling him about one of my oldest friends from elementary school getting engaged: he said "Well I intend to marry you." That's nice and all, but what worries me is that there is no concrete plan. We've never discussed our future in any concrete way. I am not keen on having kids (and will likely have some problems conceiving anyway, given some current health issues), but would consider adoption. We have not ever talked about this. I suspect this will not be dealbreaker, but I have had a couple of friends whose bf's of several years broke up with them after swearing they were cool with not wanting kids. He keeps talking about wanting to buy a house (or condo, in our case - houses in NYC are expensive!), but not about getting married.

As I've mentioned, he's not really a talker. Like many of you out there, I am closing in on age 30, and I am one of two left of my collective group of high school and college friends that is not yet engaged or married. I have been to a ton a weddings over the last two years, and every time I get a little sad because I know I am probably not going to be next. As you might imagine, I'm really starting to freak out. There is no question in my mind that he is the person I want to be with for the rest of my life, but I have no guarantee at this point that he is thinking the same. (Obviously, there are no guarantees in life, but I need something!). He's not a talker - I'm always the one to bring it up if I'm having a problem with him or something he does or whatever. I'm not very good at approaching serious conversations with him either - we are both terribly nonconfrontational, although lately I've been better about expressing myself. In mind I really thought we'd be at least engaged by this point, and so I'm not sure how to go about determining if marriage in the cards for us. Well, without sounding like I'm giving him an ultimatum (though I technically want to). I am turning 30 next March, and have lots of anxiety about many things in terms of being where I thought I'd be in life, marriage being a major one. My career has slowly taken off once I figured it all out 3 years ago, but as the days go by, I am starting to fear that I may not get married to my current bf. I have tried dropping hints, being a little snarky whenever weddings or engangements are brought up - no reaction (at least he doesn't react on the outside, and I clearly have no idea what's going on in his head).

Apologies for the long story, but would love to hear ANY and ALL advice anyone has about broaching the subject, waiting it out, dealing with general anxiety and frustration, talking about it vs. ignoring it..... I am at the point where when either he or I brings up someone else's engagement or wedding, I get really tense. And I hate that. There are many things in life I look forward to - marriage being one of them - and I just want it to happen already!

Thanks for lending an ear (or two eyes in this case!).

Well first off, welcome!  Always happy to lend my two eyes  

I don't know that I have too much advice to give because I am still in the waiting stage myself.  The one thing that helped ease some of my anxiety was communicating my feelings to him.  Think about what you really want to say to him, ultimatums aside, and as hard as it is, talk to him about how you feel.  You may be surprised to hear his side, or even learn that he didn't (or doesn't) realize how important this is to you.  Good luck!

Hi! Welcome to the Hive!

I think this is a man that you clearly love and that you have had a very long term relationship with-- 3 years is definitely serious enough to begin talking about issues like marriage. I think its odd that this topic hasn't come up before this point. If you were 19 or something it might be different, but you are both mature adults-- don't you think its strange that you two haven't discussed the future much beyond the immediate moment?

I don't mean that in a critical way, my boyfriend is very quiet also. Sometimes its like pulling teeth to get him to talk about a subject. I just wonder why you haven't felt comfortable enough talking about this topic with him. Are you afraid that bringing up marriage might scare him? If he is comfortable enough to joke about it, I doubt that is the case. You must find a way to talk about where your relationship is headed with your boyfriend. If you can't discuss the possibility of marriage with your boyfriend of 3 years at age 30, how will you two handle other difficult subjects in the years to come? Is there more to the story that we don't know?

I would suggest broaching the topic in a serious way-- not offhanded or joking, but not confrontational. Explain to him that you really love him, you have no doubt that he is the one fo ryou, and you would love to know where he sees your relationship going. The fact that you are on the boards with the rest of us shows that you are uneasy in some way about the idea of talking to him-- but none of us can really guide you or help until you do just that.

Please keep us posted on how this turns out-- you seem to really care for him, it will all work out for the best.

Thanks fellow bees for all of the advice and support! I really appreciate everyone's responses. I do have a follow-up: given my nonconfrontational personality, I really struggle with just broaching potentially uncomfortable subjects. Of course, I was the one who brought up moving in together and I thought I was going to die. A very difficult thing to bring up, but I was in a situation where I was under duress: I lived and worked in Queens at the time and he in Manhattan; his lease was ending and his management co. raised his rent and he was planning to move to Brooklyn, which in NYC constitutes a long distance relationship! But I was super nervous when I did it, and maybe didn't start off quite the right way - in fact, I think he actually thought I was going to break up with him, but obviously I wanted the opposite! It clearly turned out ok for me, but still makes me incredibly nervous to think about having this discussion. Why? I don't know. Any ideas for broaching the subject? I can't really imagine doing it out of the blue....I'm just not very good at it. Did anyone wait for a segue during an existing conversation? Did anyone have luck just sitting around and bringing it up out of nowhere? Any ideas would be helpful!

@CorgiTales - that is an AWESOME story! Hilarious. I love that dudes are sooo clueless, especially about kids. I feel like I have the conversation about a lot of things, and even though I'm thinking about extending a funny situation into a more serious discussion, I think I end up bungling the words and the conversation dies. I'm a writer. I do better with words on paper than those that come out of my mouth! Joking certainly takes the edge off, but I find it only somewhat effective. He's an UBER laid back guy so the mood with us in general is very light. Not that it's a bad thing, but as you might guess, makes it difficult to have serious conversations. I'm kind of over saying things in jest at this point. I know I know, I'm not making it easier on myself! I don't want to take the funny lighthearted approach but I am super freaked out of a serious discussion. I'm wondering if there is a happy medium?

Also, I HATE romantic comdies - they literally make me want to vommit. He feels the same. The movie route is worth a shot for sure, but it's not very "us." 

Just found out today his youngest sister is preggers, but there wasn't really an opportunity to discuss - I was in the middle of laundry, washing dishes and packing for my business trip this week. I mean I know I'm exaggerating but I feel like EVERYONE I know is getting engaged, married, blah blah blah. And I know it sounds like I am making excuses, but I haven't really felt like an appropriate moment has arisen yet. We've been out in public, or in the middle of something or someone changes the subject... I keep telling myself the next time he mentions someone getting engaged, I am going to bring it up. Needless to say, I'm kind of dragging my feet.

Thanks for suggestions ladies!

@crebre80 - his other sister already has a baby, and I'm def being called "Aunt" by the family. too late for that one! his sis and her husband actaully tried this face recognition thing and hung photos of everyone in the immediate family above the baby's crib, including mine! the freak out is stemming more from not having a plan and not having really discussed our future than freaking out that it's not actually going to happen. i think his family would probably kill him with their bare hands if he didn't end up with me... hehe hee

@akd0110 - that's a really good suggestion. i think writing down what i want to say would certainly help. i would actually like to have a conversation about it, but maybe writing it down might help with some of my anxiety about having the conversation. we are very much email/chat/text communicators for that very reason. and often times i'll say something when i do try to have a serious conversation with him, it comes out TOTALLY wrong and of course he takes it the wrong way. i definitely don't want to pressure him into something he doesn't want to do, but i feel like we're sort of beyond hypotheticals and gchat talks. i'm no type A, but i'm the consummate planner and i like to know what happens long in advance of when it does. and he, of course, is not. which works fine in day-to-day life, but as you can imagine, i'm starting to get a little uneasy that by this point in our relationship, only an assumption is being made that we will end up together and there's been no concrete plans made or at least thrown around. sigh. part of me feels like he's getting overly comfortable with things as they are, and i think we need to both be put out of our comfort zone to make this happen.

thanks bees for the advice! i'm going to do some thinking over the next couple of months. we have a trip to Mexico planned for October, which is a month before our four year anniversary. it will be just the two of us, and we'll be out of element and not have the day-to-day pressures of life on us, so maybe i'll force us to have a chat. i'll keep you posted!

Hi Bees -

Just a quick update. I decided that I couldn't take it anymore. I was out having drinks with the BF and his best friend, who started talking about the conversation he was having with his SO about rings. They've been together for about a year and change, so naturally the fact that he was talking about buying this girl a ring in a real way totally ruined my mood for the rest of the evening. I was kind of quiet for the rest of the night and when we finally got home, I dropped it. I basically said that I found it interesting that his friend and friend's SO had only been together for not even 2 years and he's planning to propose to her at some point, and that alot of our other friends were either married or well on their way there, and that we haven't even had one serious conversation about it. And I point blank asked "What's your timeline?". He paused for a moment, and looked a little bit nervous. But then he said the he loved me and that he certainly wanted to marry me and he's been thinking about proposing lately and ultimaely he saw it happening "sooner rather than later". Me being who I am, I was like "WHAT DOES THAT MEAN???" and of course, he wants it to be a surprise so he was trying not to give it away. I told him I wasn't looking for a hard date, but more that I wanted to know he was planning on it in the very near future. He also said he's been thinking about how to go about getting a ring and whether or not he should involve me in the process. The actual ring has never been that important to me (although I do loooove antiques, which fortunately don't cost an arm and a leg), so I said if he wanted to keep it a surprise, that's fine with me. But I also brought up the fact that we had to start mapping out a life plan (short term as it may be) for ourselves if we are going to get married. We talked about having kids and we're very much on the same page about that - we like them, but we value our quality of life and our careers, but I mentioned that if he did change his mind down the road, I'd be open to adoption, which he was cool with. We're going to start sacking away money so that we can start working towards the two next big things - a wedding and buying some kind of property. Obviously there are many more details to be worked out, but I obviously feel better that I've laid everything out on the table!!!

Of course, you all do realize that at some point I'm going to drive myself crazy if the ring doesn't arrive when I want it to ;)  But this is a step in the right direction at least!

Thanks for all the support and I can't wait to start planning the rest of my life with the best guy in the whole world!

I'm trying to put it out of my mind because at least the air has been cleared, but now (of course) I can help but think when it's going to happen!! My suspicion is by the end of the year, but I also don't want to set myself up for disappointment...it would be awesome if it happened on our upcoming trip to Mexico in a little over a month, but I don't know that he'll have had time or money to have researched and bought a ring by then. Our 4 year anniversary is happening at the end of November, but his whole family is usually in town on Veteran's Day weekend (beg of November), so that's a possibility....

I also relinquished my wanting to be involved with the ring-buying process, but of course I'm looking at rings online :) I actually found a place that has really lovely, inexpensive rings that have totally blown my original ideas about what I wanted. Is it cool to drop hints? Is there a creative way to let him know I like a particular style or jeweler w/out necessarily bugging him about it or sending him the link to the jeweler's website? He's bought me nice, interesting and different jewelry in the past so I trust his judgement for the most part. I just don't want him to think that I expect some giant rock that costs a fortune....

Thanks Barista! It feels really good to have gotten that out of my system.

@jm1773 - that's hilarious! i'm kind of shameless but i told him if he wanted to make the whole thing a surprise, i wouldn't ruin it by asking about the details.... but i totally know what you mean, particularly if your SO doesn't have good taste. it's not that i care that much, but us girls like to daydream about these things - you know how it is....so i've been taking breaks at work and surfing for rings and dresses ;)

would it be so wrong to go to jewelry store on my own, browse around, pick up a card, and "accidentally" leave it lying around on the kitchen or coffee table? this scheming is actually kinda fun!