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You can't push him into doing something he doesn't feel ready to do. That is no way to start a life together. Have you gone to couple's counseling? It sounds like you have some communicaiton issues to work through before a big commitment like marriage.
I know that I shouldn't push him and I don't feel like I am. I have talked with him and expressed my desires for the relationship. That is as far as it has gone though. I don't really think he understands how important this is to me
Think about it this way. Say he does propose, and says he wants a long engagement and doesn't want to set a date. You wait...and wait... and eventually you have to say, "When do you want to get married?" What are you going to do if it turns out he doesn't want to get married, and you're ready? Or worse, if you get engaged and find out that he doesn't want to marry you? He shouldn't propose until he knows. And what he's told you is that he doesn't know yet.
Some men have a "timeline." My husband never imagined himself getting married before age 30. He had this mental timeline of what his life would be like. It took us having a very frank conversation about our relationship and our expectations. I told him that I had my own timeline, and it involved being married and having children before age 30. He said he knew he wanted to be with me forever, and intended fully to marry me, but he didn't think of himself marrying before 30. He realized that I wasn't going to wait for the magic moment when he turned 30 and declared himself ready to marry, and that to be married we would have to be partners, and that meant working with each others' timelines.
Talk to your boyfriend. Tell him how you feel: but don't pressure him or give him an ultimatum. After that, it's up to you. If you want to wait it out a few more years and see where it goes, do it. If you want to leave and find someone who is ready for marriage sooner, go for it. It's your decision.
My situation is very similar to amandoplis'. I'm 28 and my fiance is 29. I was ready for a proposal back in 07, but it didn't happen until 09. We'll be dating for 6 years in August so we had enough time to "know" we want to spend the rest of our lives together.
It was at about the 4 year mark when I brought up marriage too. When I brought it up he said he wasn't ready and he won't be for a while. He did say that I will be his wife, but just "not now". So, I waited another year, then brought it up again. He still wasn't "ready", so I basically told him if he doesn't do it soon (meaning within a year), I'm leaving his a**. He wasn't very happy about his "ultimatum", but I felt that I was being realistic since we've been dating so long already and we're getting in to the late 20s.
In the end, he did propose and it was a couple months after the 1 year deadline. Men do have their own timelines and unfortunately it doesn't coincide with ours! So, going through what I did, I think 24 may be too early for your guy to propose. Mine wasn't "ready" until 29! I think you should just give him time to come around, but not tooo much. You two are definitely still young so use this time to save $$ for your amazing wedding! That's what I did while I was "waiting". I had about 2 years to save and I'm so glad I still have another 14 months!
Although I felt the same way you did in wanting to get married at 22, I am glad I waited. I've changed so much over the years that I'm a totally different person than I was at 22. At 22 I was having fun. I went out with friends every weekend. But now that I work every day for 8 hours a day, my life has changed so much. My values have changed and the things I want to do are different than they once used to be.
You need to give yourself some time to really get to know who you are before getting married. The worse that that could happen is getting married 10 years from now and wondering who it is you married. Take the time to go out, hang out with friends, and stop thinking about marriage for a bit. There's nothing worse than having a marriage end up in divorce when you keep on pushing someone who isn't ready.
If he's not ready to give you the ring, it's because he's not ready to make the commitment. You can't force him to do it, and ultimatums are almost always a bad idea. But you have just as much power in this situation as he does: if you are really ready at this point in your life to get married and that's what you want more than anything, you have to be prepared to walk away and find it (and I don't mean "I'll leave unless..." I mean "We don't want the same things; I'm leaving now"). And if what you want is him more than anything, then you have to be patient (realizing that he may have other things in mind for your futures than you do, since he hasn't totally committed).
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I agree with amandopolis and hhcheung!
FI and I dated for six years before we got engaged. Around 4 years into it I was READY (well I thought I was) and was hinting BIG TIME. We talked about it and I realized that he has thought about it but wanted to wait until he was 100% ready. We both just turned 25 and got engaged in March and I am so glad we waited but even still, we are both so young! I say take a deep breath and start to distract yourself from the "E" word for a little while. When it happens, it happens.
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From me: I think you may be jumping the gun a little. He may love you with all of his heart but isn't ready or isn't sure that he is ready to settle down and have children and support a family. These days marriage doesn't mean what it used to. Don't worry your self too much, you've got to make sure that both of you are ready for this.
Best of luck!!!
From my Fiance: "Okay you've been together 4years, how do you not know whether or not you're ready for marriage in that time. If you sit down and talk about it, and find out you're on different pages in the relationship then you are unequally yoked. Which will simply not work because one of you (probably you) will always be pouring your heart into the relationship while he reaps the benefits with out doing any of the work. How is that fair? its not. Give him an ultimatum, it's been long enough.
that's my two cents. "
I agree with a lot of the comments above and wanted to add something:
Ask yourself how happy you will truly be if he just gave in to you and agreed to get engaged. Won't it always be in the back of your head that you forced him into it?
Don't sabotage your relationship for a ring. It's like cutting off your nose to spite your face. Fiance thought that he'd never get married until he was 30. Then he happened to meet and fall in love with a girl that was 11 years older than him.
I never once pushed or requested marriage, although we did have a few frank discussions about kids and how we could fit that into a future together.
I don't think pushing for what you want helps in this case. It builds resentment and distrust.
I'm not going to tell you what to do, but ask if it is really worth losing the love of your life over this. If you are true loves, then he'll still be there a year or two years from now, and if you are not, things will crumble... but the crumbling will happen whether or not you are engaged/married or dating. No reason to rush things. Try and enjoy the moments you have now, because this is a special time in life!
As the person who was "not ready yet" for more than a year after he was, I say wait. Everyone takes their time to figure out what's right for them. My FI just doesn't overthink things as much as I do...so he just realized one day he was sure. I needed space to do the mental gymnastics that I always do around big decisions. And then one day I was ready.
I can't say exactly what it must have been like for him. He let me know that he was willing to wait, but that he couldn't promise it would be years (we're also a bit older so waiting has bigger implications for our future)...we'd revisit if he started to get antsy.
But I'm concerned that you say you are crying yourself to sleep every night. that sounds miserable. And I'm wondering if you've gotten yourself worked up by convincing yourself he doesn't want to marry you, or if you're reacting to something else. It sounds like you're maybe feeling pretty insecure in his feelings for you...more than just the angst of waiting for a person to decide if they are ready to get married. Like you are maybe worried that he doesn't want to be with *you*, not just not ready to be married?? That would be very difficult. Can you talk to him about separating those issues?
I felt the same way as you did a few years ago. Looking back, I realize that I wasn't necessarily ready to be married, I just really wanted to be engaged. All my friends were getting married and it made me jealous. I was seriously considering leaving him at one point because he could not tell me when we would move to that next step. I cried it out with my mom and sister one day and my sister asked if I could honestly see myself with anyone else. I said no. She said, well wouldn't you rather be with him (not married/engaged) but extremely happy or alone and miserable. So I let it be. Some men just have to do things in their own time.
If you were dating for four years in your mid-late 30s, I would strongly support your sitting your boyfriend down and explain how important it is for you to get married and have children. If you were dating a guy with serious commitment issues as he approached his 40th birthday, this story would be really unlikely to end well. But your boyfriend is 24, so there is room for hope. There are many 24 year old men who aren't quite mature enough to get married yet, but they will still make great husbands and fathers in a few years.
It's a really tough situation, since you are (quite understandably) feeling hurt and resentful. And this hurt and resentment can eat away at the fabric of your relationship before your boyfriend can finish maturing and be ready to get married. I was never able to successfully navigate this particular minefield with any of my exes, but hopefully someone who was able to get a reluctant FI to commit has more specific advice.
If you love him so much and know you want to spend the rest of your life with him, then you should be patient and give him all the time he needs. If you give him the ultimatum and force him to make a decision before he is ready, you are only asking for disaster. Do you want him to ask you because he is ready and doesn't have a doubt in his mind? Or do you want him to ask you because YOU think he is ready now and you want a ring on your finger?
Try not to get caught up in the idea of being engaged/married. Why are you in such a hurry? You are both young yet, and have a lot of life ahead of you.
as someone who can ultimatly relate to your situation, at 23 and my FI 24 I was in the same boat as you, we started out young, 16 and 17 yrs old so it was kind of like, oh my god when are we going to get married (I was thinking this at 21) He was so not ready at the time and didnt agree with it at all either. It made me think why doesnt he want to marry me etc. I had many sleepless nights over it and debated our entire relationship. I never wanted to push my FI though, which is something you shouldnt do either. I really wanted to wait it out because I knew he wanted to be with me...I didnt see the relationship ending, and a few years later we were engaged.
Men are simple creatures most of the time, maybe because you want it so bad and he knows this - he doesnt want it. I am sure your time will come. You guys wouldnt be together for 4 years if he didnt have it already in his mind that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with you!
when I gave up on the slight nagging of wanting to get married, and asking when it would happen I was much happier with just the thought of "us" that all that didn't matter, and the proposal came as the BIGGEST suprise of my life as I had no clue!
I think that if you love him as much as you say you do, you will respect his choice and wait until he is ready. Marriage is a couple thing and forcing him into something he doesnt want may cause further issues.
Stick with it, and cheer up. You have a great guy who is honest with you. Its not like he said he doesnt want to get married... he does, just not now. Thats positive. :)
No offense, but if you're happy being with him and know that you want to be with him forever, what's the hurry to get married? Can't you just be together and enjoy it? If and when he's ready to propose, he will.
I am in a bit of the opposite situation from yours. My FI asked me to marry him a few months back, and I said yes, but there is no ring yet, and we haven't told anyone, because I'M not ready. He is waiting for me to tell him I'm ready, but he's in no hurry. He says he'll gladly be with me forever, even if we're not married, and I very much appreciate that. Because really, all that matters is that we're together; we don't need rings to prove it.
I've been with my FI since I was 19. When we first started getting serious, he talked about joinining the military and then we would get married. At the time we thought it was the greatest idea ever. Well, looking back on it, we weren't ready and things would have gone sour very fast.
I know I'm only three years older than you, but I think you should wait until you're a little older. You both need time to get your lives together, before adding a spouse. Besides, if he's not ready, you shouldn't force him into a marriage.
I was in the opposite situation. FI wanted to get married, worried me about it, and I wasn't ready. He either had to accept that, or move on. When I told him I needed some time before talking marriage and kids, he had to decide what HE wanted. Was it marrying me a few years down the road? Or was it finding someone else to fit his timeline? We stuck together, and when he gave me time, I eventually was ready.
My point is, this isn't a guy thing or a girl thing. It's just about you as individuals, and how you fit together. I think that if you love him as much as you say, and you've stuck together this long, you should just give it more time. He's obviously committed to you, so don't go down the path of destruction just yet. Anytime someone is forced into something, it doesn't really end up playing out the way you want.
I agree with previous posters that if you truly love him and are committed to him, you would want to wait until he is ready. Would you really want to be engaged only because he was "forced" into it? Whenever I want something really, really badly and am met with opposition, I always find it helpful to examine my own motives. Why do I want this thing so badly that it affects how happy I am in the present? What's the reason the other person is giving for not wanting the same and is it logical?
In your case, it sounds like you both love each other and want to be together, but engagement and marriage is a pretty huge step. Give him a little time. It might be hard on you, but try not to focus so much on what you don't have, but on what you do have -- a four year commitment and counting -- and look forward to the future positively. Then, when it does happen, it will be that much more sweet.
Guys are programmed to want to take their time getting married. Girls are programmed to want to get married sooner. Unfortunately in your situation, you're at those difficult ages where there are differences. (Kind of like where girls go through puberty 2-3 years before boys.) It's just an unfortunate coming together of several factors.
1.You've been dating for a while.
2.You're both young.
3.He's only two years older than you.
If you just met at 22, you wouldn't be pushing the issue. If you were both older, either he would ready, or you would be more justified in walking out the door. If you were still 22, and he was more like 28, he would probably be more ready to get married.
Bottom line, don't let a couple of details you can't control like your age, and when you met make you throw away a relationship, that you feel is meant to be. Maybe you feel it's unfair to have to date longer than you wish. But there is no specific timeline that works for everyone. You just have to do what will be right for your life and future.
P.S. Another thought with an answer to your original post title -- I wouldn't leave. Would you rather be with someone else who wants to get married just to get married, but doesn't love you? Just because your bf can't offer you engagement and marriage right now, doesn't mean he won't be able to later. Just hang in there :)
I had this come up once, and I kind of decided this- either I love him enough to stay regardless of when/if we were to ever get married, or, I need more, and need to leave. Oddly, within months of deciding to stay (we'd been together 5 years) he proposed.
It's kind of weird for some guys they don't feel ready for marriage till they feel they can support their future family on their own, maybe at 24 he feels he can't provide for you like he would like that's why he wants to wait.
I understand where you are coming from you guys have been together for 4 years and you want to know if he's commited to you. Maybe that's the root of the issue?
I am with professorbee on this one. I just turned 40 and have a truly different timeline than you do.
When I married my xh, I didn't even do that until I had just turned 27 (engaged at 26). I was out of college, working at a great job, could AFFORD being married and having all the responsibilities that went along with it and so did he.
I personally could not have imagined getting married any earlier than I did with my x. And even after I divorced, I still was single for quite a few years too before meeting my guy (single for 3). These days the economy is tough. The interest rates are rising, inflation on the move, and it's just possibly best to have that online degree you're working towards first and have him accomplish maybe a goal or two he also has in mind.
I am sure he loves you. But seriously, you HAVE time on your side. You really do. You have plenty.
Have a heart to heart with him and discuss your worries and also your wishes for a longer engagement.
I dated my college bf for three years. We broke up when I was 23, almost 24. We were at the "put up or shut up" phase that many of my college friends went thru with their honeys and we broke up. He was in law school and I was in professional school and it would have been A NIGHTMARE had we married so young.
I can also tell you that you will change many of your life perspectives in the next few years. I did a helluva lot of maturing at the age of 25.
Just some thoughts.
Does he really know how much this upsets you? You say you've talked about it, but I know from my own experience that there were times that we talked, but I didn't tell FH how deeply I felt about things and how much the subject might be tearing me up inside.
I don't think you should give him any kind of ultimatum, but it sounds like you two are on different pages completely. Could you try talking again and make him realize you both need to give a little on this. Like, you can wait for X years or however long, but he needs to see how much it bothers you and instead of waiting 4 years, he should try to step it up and only say 2, or whatever. Like other posters here, I think you have time on your side, but regardless, if it's bothering you this much, I encourage you to be really honest with him and try to work something out.
Good luck!
Sometimes a person knows they want to spend the rest of their lives with that person, that they are "the one", etc. But they're not ready to get engaged. In this situation, a promise ring can be a good idea. I know it sounds very old school, but it can be a nice step towards engagement, a way of the guy (or girl) saying to the gal (or guy) "I love you, I want to spend the rest of my life with you, and when we're both ready, we'll get engaged". Guys can wear promise rings as well. Any piece of jewelry or significant object would do as well for those who don't like to wear rings.
Of course when that sort of promise is made, the couple should have discussed the timeline and what's necessary to move on to the next step.
ugh! i went through the same thing and i know what a horrible feeling it is! i was 21 when we met and got engaged on my 26th bday. i think it really all depends on what he is telling you, and if you believe him. in our case, my fiance always said he wanted to marry me when it was right for both of us, and i think his financial situation is what held him back the most. when he got accepted to his mba program i finally told him that if we were not engaged when he started his program that he would be starting it without me. He did propose and said later that he should have sooner. you really have to be the one to judge if he is being honest with you and try to figure out why he's dragging his feet. pushing someone to marry you is the worst feeling, but when you've had enough you'll know, and you'll be ready to walk away knowing that as hurt as you feel it will be better than waiting a lifetime for a ring that never comes. go with your heart.
best of luck to you;)
When I was 22, I started dating a guy who was still trying to finish school and get things together. I always thought we'd get married, but I started to grow impatient. A lot of people told me to chill out and just be patient. Well, long story short - after many years of dating and patience, it became CRYSTAL clear that he wasn't going to grow up, so I walked away. I wish I could take that time back, but I can't. I wish I listened to my gut feeling of knowing he'd never grow up, but I gave him the benefit of the doubt.
There's nothing you can do to get him to be as ready as you are. He has to do it on his own. The question is - are YOU willing to wait for HIM.
Since you've discussed this, I'm curious what he's told you about knowing when he'd be ready. Are there certain life goals he feels like he wants to accomplish first?
I guess I don't understand the difference between waiting until you are both ready, getting engaged and getting married and getting engaged, waiting . . . .then getting married. Is that just that you want to be engaged,?I mean the end result will be the same whether you get engaged today or 2 years from now right? Also, do you really want to marry someone who has to think about marrying you?? hmmm . . .Not sure what to tell you.
I also was interested in your comment about wanting to be engaged, but then willing to wait for a while (years?) before getting married. It is my own opinion (and I don't mean/want to force it on anyone!) that if you are going to get engaged, you should be ready to be married, and engagements shouldn't happen before then. My friend told me this, and it worked wonders- would you be willing to marry this man without an engagement ring, without a dress, without a reception, without the whole hurrah that is a wedding? Would you be willing to walk down to the justice of the peace, fork over you $40 and sign that marriage certificate? These questions really shed some light on some of my past relationships, as well as the one I have with my husband.
I totally agree with meganmp1 ... I think people get caught up in the idea of being "engaged" and wanting the "bling". They want the fantasy wedding ... not the marriage.
The question should be if you would be willing to hit city hall and be married and spend the rest of your life together tomorrow.
If you are willing to just walk out on him because he "isn't ready" maybe you aren't ready, because if you truly love and want to marry him you will wait for him to be ready.
Take some other steps togehter (which you may have) like living together, getting a pet, or maybe some sort of project together (re-tiling a kitchen or painting your den, etc) that you can take pride in. Find ways to celebrate your relationship that you can look fondly on. It's NOT all about the ring, it's about the realtionship, and you don't want to pressure him. Guys aren't blinded by the bling! So they know when they are ready. Let him surprise you on his own time :)
I don't think age has anything to do with it... I think each person has their own idea of what their life is like... for example the posts about their men not wanting to get married until they are 30. For my guy... he is 20, and I am 21, and we have been together for 4 years... and he was ready to marry me when we graduated from high school!! I have been holding out on him... becuase I feel we are sooo young, but then we moved in together and 2 months later all I can think about now is how much i want him to propse. Weird. It really snuck up on me!
So maybe take the suggestion a few others said... take some big steps together that are a little less drastic than getting engaged, and maybe by doing those things that will help him realize what he wants faster... kinda how it did for me.
Try not to second guess yourself and the relationship you share. Be confidant in who you are and that your guy loves you. And ask him to clarify if he is not sure he wants to get married to you, at all, or just right now. It might be a harsh conversation, but it is something that needs to be talked about so you can live with out the forbodding feeling you have right now.
Best of luck!!
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I am 22 years old and my boyfriend is 24. We have been dating for 4 years next month. I realize that since we started young, that we will probably date for longer than most people before we get married. I really want to get engaged SOON. It is all I can think about. I love him so much and I don't want anybody else. We both have good jobs and I am going to school online part-time. I am fine with being engaged for a couple of years, but I really feel like I am ready to move to the next step and get engaged. I have told him this, and he doesn't agree. He doesn't want to have a long engagement and refuses to get engage before he is absolutely ready to get married. I find myself crying myself to sleep at night because I am so upset about this. I really love him and can't imagine my life without him, but if he can't give me what I really desire, should I leave him? or am I asking too much of him? Do you want two different things?
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