Well hello there everybody! Of course I couldnt resist joining your awesome hive!
So I'll be 18 in a couple of weeks and getting married to that special someone mid or late 2013- who knows! Maybe even early 2013
I don't have to worry about wedding money because well...thats just not how We operate
Everything is going to cost around $1000 MAXIMUM! But enough about my wedding pocketbook. My real question is- how do you and your YoungGuy financially provide for yourselves while simultantously attending college? Dear MIL wants us to move in with her if it comes to that (which is a different post all on its own). However I would much rather wait to marry/move in if the possibility of us getting our own place within a short period of time is very faint on the horizon. And If I did move with them/him, It would be from the East Coast all the way to Detroit, Michigan. Which scares the wits out of a small town girl like me! I want a breakdown of how you make it work money wise (without getting to private). If want more background info on me check below ;)
[This isnt a request to try and convince me NOT to marry yet and wait or to lecture me about how miserabley hard it will be. Im quite aware of that, which is why Im trying now to a get a peek into the future based on your expierences. But your all so beautifully nonjudgmental here, I know I wont have to worry.
]
]
Oopsy forgot one little detail! I do not believe in not getting married to focus on school, career, etc. Which means I do not "date" due to my religous beliefs (which I love). So when you all suggest for me and YoungGuy to wait, keep in mind that though we might wait, we would not be "dating". Love you guys ;)
I am a firm believer in not getting married until you are financially ready to support yourselves as husband and wife, without the assistance of anyone else.
At this point, I do not see what the rush is. You are both 18 years old. I would suggest focusing on school and then getting married.
@arsing89: I agree. With the not marrying until your financially ready. Because how much of a hubby wife can you really be if you cant even provide for yourselves. Your right about that arsing89.
You're 17, dependent upon your parents, have never had a job, and have no plan on how to live on your own. This is not judgement, this is experience speaking- please wait!
Regardless of whether you are married or not, it is important to learn how to support yourself once you go to college. Research costs of apartments and utilities in the town you and your boyfriend will be living in, find a job that you can work while going to class, and map out how much it costs to support yourself for a month (food, clothes, toiletries, etc).
It would probably be much easier if you waited until at least one of you has graduated. Alternatively, you could do what many otherstudents do and share an apartment with a couple other students, assuming you both find a part time job. I would have prefered to have waited until I graduate next year and find a proper job over in my fiance's country, but due to immigration restrictions and time limits we have to make our relationship legal asap.
It sounds like your only option would be to live with family to save money. I went to school full time, worked part time 20 hours a week, and graduated magma cum laude so it is possible. But living on my own without help from my parents would have been impossible. If you won't wait, then living with family is probably the only way to make it work. There are some scholarships for nursing/medical field where they pay for school plus some living expenses if you sign a contract to work at a low income facility for xxx years after you graduate. You could look into scholarships.
I agree with the other Bees- wait! I also wanted to add a BS in midwifery is not even a degree.. Midwifes require at least a masters degree.
@wakyzakki: I'm just curious, how are you defining "dating" in this post? This is not to criticize your beliefs or anything, it would just help to give better advice. Does this mean if you and your FI don't get married right now, you won't be together at all?
@wakyzakki: Also, as another PP has mentioned, midwifery requires A LOT of school. My cousin started taking classes for midwifery and ended up quitting because they are really difficult. I'm not trying to discourage you from doing what you want. BUT, in the long run, juggling school + work + husband + keeping up with a household is going to be difficult.
May I ask why you feel the need to get married right now is?
@Britt_RN: Thats what I thought, but a B.S in Midwifery is actually a degree Not many schools offer it, but it is recognized. (Not all proper midwives have to be R.Ns to be legal)
@wakyzakki: I think that to get married you should be an adult and be able to support yourselves.
Marriage is a serious step and to be taken while your not even able to support yourselves makes it sound like you're taking it lightly.
Why can't you date? because of distance?
@MeelaMay: Hey sounds like we are in similar situations! where are you and your SO from?
@arsing89: Yeah, Im worried about schooling and managing a household, even if it is only of two. 
I feel inclined to marry because as a living human being with emotions, logic, hormones, and reflections, I much rather be married than single. And I figured Id better contemplate about it now before I grow desprate and irrational lol. The dynamics of my marrige would be very differant than the typical marrige here in the States because of my religous beliefs and how they suggest things should operate. Just as some people enjoy dating v.s being single, its quite the same thing. (Not to say that they feel incomplete without a partner). My mother thinks that besides the natural reasons why I want to marry, its because Ive recently met a truck load of young married couples in my age range who happen to be doing just fine. I have to admit, she is partially right lol.
And yes, if my FI and I werent married, we would not be together. I prefer not to elaborate as Im sure it would produce some form of bias/hate amongst the responders. I understand where the opinion would be coming from, but would rather not "bait" someone into saying anything rude. 
@arsing89: This times 1000!
OP If you can't financially support yourself just yet, and your FI can't financially support himself, how the heck do you plan to financially support eachother? You say you don't believe in dating, well if you put off the wedding it's not dating it's a longer engagement.
@wakyzakki: I'm not sure I'm still figuring out how this all works but I think it can be done (private messages I mean)
Anyway to explain briefly My SO is from the states whereas I'm half irish and half italian but raised in the UK so for us to move to the states we would have to be married so i could have a visa. It is a maze! it has been driving us insane!
I'm really not trying to judge here, but I sincerely hope that you're not getting married because you want to start having sex and/or live together. There are many Bees around here who have talked about having married before 22 and know of many others who were married before 22 and are all now in their late 20s and divorced and/or in their second marriages/relationships.
I agree with what the PPs have said - you've never had a job yourself nor lived alone, let alone be able to juggle school and managing a household. Please wait.
@walnutgirl: actually you don't need to be married to have a visa. There is the K-1 visa, for fiance(e)s and there's the IR-1/CR-1 for spouses (married outside the US).
@walnutgirl: Oh boy :/ I know tons of couples who married internationally and struggled with the whole visa issue. But they were able to do it- that being said, I hope everything works out for you
@wakyzakki: I don't understand what you're so bashful about. You're a virgin who doesn't date (but rather courts, I'm guessing), and I would also guess that you don't believe in kissing someone until you're married. There have been people on this board with similiar views...some even more conservative, if I'm not guessing correctly.
Your last response makes no sense. Why does being a human equal NEEDING to get married? Are you trying to say that your baby-making hormones are pumping and you want to get married so you can have sex and have children? I understand if you're too shy to say these words, but I'm also a firm believer that if you can't even say the word sex, you shouldn't be having sex.
Also, this: Not to say that they feel incomplete without a partner Please explain this, because I hope you're not saying that you feel incomplete without a husband.
@strawbs: Nope, not the case at all- in referance to the sex comment. I think I posted this on the wrong board lol.
@wakyzakki: do you believe that you've posted on the wrong board because you're not being told what you want to be told?
@BooRadley: I was saying the exact opposite of that. I was saying that if someone feels "incomplete" without any form of a partner, then how can they marry someone if they arent emotionally or mentally stable themselves is what I was saying. There are some people who litteraly feel depressed if they arent married or dating!
I guess I do have to be a bit more specific. Being a human being does impact a persons natural inclination towards a relationship (marrige, dating, etc) unless of course theyve grown up in a situation or had something happen to them that changed that.
For me, in planning my future- babymaking, sex, kissing, and all that other "jazz" are of course thoughts. But they are not things that impact the age I decide to marry. Be that tomorrow or when Im 45. Because of my religion my views on marriage are quite different than what Im taught they should be by my non-conservative American culture. I hope that clears up any further ideas that Im looking towards marrige to fullfill some sort of sex drive or something.
@strawbs: we have been doing some research, it helps also knowing many people at the us embassy here!
The K1 visa is:
The fiancé(e) K-1 nonimmigrant visa is for the foreign-citizen fiancé(e) of a United States (U.S.) citizen. The K-1 visa permits the foreign-citizen fiancé(e) to travel to the United States and marry his or her U.S. citizen sponsor within 90 days of arrival. The foreign-citizen will then apply for adjustment of status to a permanent resident (LPR) with the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). Because a fiancé(e) visa permits the holder to immigrate to the U.S. and marry a U.S. citizen shortly after arrival in the United States, the fiancé(e) must meet some of the requirements of an immigrant visa.
IR-1/CR-1 for spouses can take up to a year to obtain so we have to plan very carefully everything.
But anyway the point is we have to be married or about to get married to obtain a visa
@strawbs: No no, because I think it should have been posted on a specific religion board- which I didnt even notice until now. And actually Im hearing exactly what I want to hear, or rather some pretty darn good advice lol. That if neither of us are financially dependent in the least way- that we should wait.
@wakyzakki: Being a human being does impact a persons natural inclination towards a relationship (marrige, dating, etc) unless of course theyve grown up in a situation or had something happen to them that changed that.
As opposed to being...what? A dog? Some other form of life that you have no way of knowing its 'inclination towards a relationship'? I hope you don't take people's questions as antagonism, I think we're just trying to piece together the puzzling story you're telling here.
ETA: good to hear that the financial concerns people are bringing up are clicking with you
@walnutgirl: well see I saw in another thread that your SO is not living in the US.
I am an international married to a US citizen too, so I don't need to know many Bees on here to know what I'm talking about :) good luck! it's a long arduous headache-inducing process, though I was already in the US when we married.
@BooRadley: This is why Im being vauge! If youre connecting a dot between what I said about human inclination and how dogs or animals feel, perhaps you skipped a few periods in your human psychology class. I hope that doesnt come off as an insult :( Im just saying. I understand the story Im telling is puzzling the more of it I write. This started as a simple question of To wait or Not to wait until finances stabilaze, and has turned into something else don't know what, but something.However Im enjoying the discussion. Just would like to note its drifiting a little. And yes, the finiancial comments are clicking
@wakyzakki: I'm similar. I've known DH since I was 6ish and he was 7ish. I never had a 'real' job until I moved out for university. I got an apartment with a roommate and he got an apartment with a roommate and we just stashed money away from our respective part-time, minimum wage jobs. We didn't so much save for the wedding as make the money for each thing as we went. Getting the money was a little rough at times but our wedding was $5000-$7000 and since yours will only be $1000ish you won't have to worry as much.
We were also homeschooled and we didn't 'date', we courted. We also waited until marriage to move in together and were 'chaste' as you put it. We were 18 when we got engaged and 19 and 20 when we got married (my 20th birthday was 2 months later). Oh, forgot to mention that we're both still in post-secondary school (we each have 1 year left at the moment).
@wakyzakki: Last one before we get back to the task at hand.
saying that a person is naturally inclined towards marriage is saying that those who never get married and have zero inclination to do so (yes they exist) are unnatural. I don't think that's for you to say at all.
@wakyzakki: anyway, I'm glad that you're listening at least. You are at liberty to do what you feel is right for yourself, but listening and taking others' advice into consideration always does good things for you :)
@wakyzakki: I hope so it's quite overwhelming!
Anyway I'm glad you're realising that getting married and having your or his parents support you is not a good idea.
i'm not much older than you and looking back at when i was 18 I feel very lucky to have had some years to live on my own and be my own person and understand who I was and what I wanted. Being indipendant and being able to provide for yourself is extremly satisfying and enriching and gives you more strenght and a better knowledge of your value when you are in a relationship.
@strawbs: Where are you from? It's so comforting to hear other people's story! I feel quite alone in this whole thing since i don't know many couples that married internationally!
@strawbs: I dont think its for anyone to say either- good thing neither of us said it ;)
By inclination I mean people are naturally drawn to other human interaction- at whatever level that may be. UNLESS something caused them not to be. For example I had a friend who had something horrible happen to her and since, hates to be touched and has sworn of any romantic feelings for anyone ever!
@wakyzakki: the swearing off romantic interest part is bullshit every time lol but the hating to be touched, that will need a lot of work from her partner.
@ScottishMrs: Good Lord, I thought that situation was nonexistant. jk. I took mental note of the fact that you lived seperate, both worked and saved before marrying. Your story was quite refreshing!
@wakyzakki: So do you court then? If you don't date...
Everyone on here will tell you not to get married. The things is, if you're going to you're going to. Just be wise with your money and work hard and it can be done.
Oh and! my BIL and SIL had a similar thing take place, although they are older. It worked out fine and they are happy.
@strawbs: I figured so, but of course haven't told her that because I dont want to sound insenitive in her head.
@emileekay: Also another refreshing comment. And I guess you could call it courting lol, thats a perfect way to put it in retrospect! I never had a name for it until now, thanks for that!
Just because you don't get married right now doesn't mean you won't get married. This isn't a "do it now or not at all" situation, so it may actually help your relationship to wait until you can financially support yourselves.
I am still with the person I was with when I was 18. But we still aren't married. (I am 100% fine with this!) We won't be married until we have graduated and found jobs. That way, we can live on our own and support ourselves.
Think of the stress living with your parents or struggling to make ends meet will take a greater toll on your relationship than waiting to marry will (it shouldn't put a strain on it at all). If my SO and I were to get married right now (believe me, we want to) it would be VERY hard on us.
Good luck with whatever you decide.
You must log in to post.
| User | Posts Today |
|---|---|
| MrsPanda99 | 42 |
| AlwaysSunny | 32 |
| jesssamesssa | 29 |
| vorpalette | 24 |
| This Time Round | 23 |
| Gemstone | 21 |
| Caroheart | 21 |
| Cyri | 19 |
| ajillity81 | 19 |
| renierose | 19 |
| User | Posts Today |
|---|---|
| Amitchell12 | 3 |
| Scorpio88 | 1 |
| GeekChic | 1 |
| hisprettygirl | 1 |
| waitingwonderland | 1 |
| FoxyBride14 | 1 |
| redbootz | 1 |
| smallstuff | 1 |
| psa22 | 1 |
| jesssamesssa | 1 |
