(Closed) Spinoff: If you married in your 20s and divorced

• amRN
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: April 2014

@208bride:  Well you got one part right … you certainly were rude.  I don’t think there is anything wrong with 20 somethings getting married, and I’m sure you and your fiance are mature and ready for the next step and will have a long and successful marriage.  But I’m confused why how much money you make and you ‘getting a grad degree’ to find a job your ‘thrilled’ with has anything to do with the topic/thread or point you were trying to make.  How does your fiance generating more income than his parents ever did relate to you being successful in yours, or anothers’ marriage?  You can be proud of your accomplishments while still maintaining some humility.  Something that comes with age perhaps?

 

@drlolaz: Amen!

• IheartUFC
• 7 years ago

@sequinlove:  On another note, a couple downstairs neighbors of our years ago had married when they were teenagers! Generally not a great idea, but they were married for 70+ yrs at that point.

• farawayviolet
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: November 2013

@FutureMRS3lastnames:  +1

Your self reflection and not living with your head in the clouds indicates maturity, OP :).

ETA: I frequently get concerned with a lot of the younger bees posting, because their tone comes across as knowing everything, and kind of living in a fantasyland (often pointing to educational or financial accomplishments as signs of maturity, and comparing how “mature” they are to all of their “immature” peers). The reality is that at 18-22ish people often believe they are more mature and the exception, and they aren’t, and believe they are a whole lot more understanding of life’s challenges than they are. They can also be terribly defensive. Your posts indicate someone who has a bit more maturity, and therefore I (as a stranger on the internet 😉 ) don’t feel the same degree of concern.

All the best for your marriage. I trust it will be a long and prosperous one 🙂

 

 

• Pepperwoodsy
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: September 2016

@sequinlove:  I totally agree with you on the kids thing. I never wanted to feel like I was stuck with someone in my life because we had a child before we considered being life partners. Having a child bonds two people together forever, whether they like it or not. I also feel that being with my Fiance has helped to me to be motivated in my studies, and he’s helped me have more ambition than I would without him. People are going to say what they are going to say. I think no matter what the circumstances of your relationship are, there is always going to be someone who thinks you are doing it wrong. What helped for me was realizing that it is incredibly difficult for most people to separate their experiences from mine. People who say things like, “Being engaged at your age is way too young,” often are saying that because they are imagining themselves at that age, it’s hard for them to realize that you are different person living in a different set of circumstances. You have to learn to appreciate the concern, and then to politely brush it off. You’ll never have 100% approval from everyone in your life no matter what decision you make. Have confidence in your decision making process, in the way your heart is leading you, and in your choices.

• spink75
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: April 2014

@sequinlove:  We did talk about it before we got married and he said he wanted to live in my country, but I came to realise eventually that it wasn’t true.

Initially, I think all we both cared about was being together but after a while as I got older and started thinking about having kids, other things like security and stability became very important.

• 208bride
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: September 2014

The point I was trying to make was that my Fiance and I are more than capable of taking on life together, which is one of the many concerns people voice about young marriages, and that we are building a better life than we came from – we are not doomed or settling for mediocrity, like so many people want to believe all young couples are.

• 208bride
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: September 2014

@drlolaz:  Are you saying “chopping block” and meaning “divorced?”  Friendly reminder that the 50% of Americans who get divorced are exactly that: Americans.  Not young Americans, not twenty-somethings, not people who didn’t go to college!  I think young marriages fail at a higher rate because they are more frequent and because, like I said, there’s a level of immaturity at play – not because they didn’t wait until the arbitrary Socially Acceptable Age of 25.

• 208bride
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: September 2014

@amRN:  It has to do with the thread because I was saying that I don’t listen to naysayers on this board who think we’re too young to get married because, clearly, we have our stuff together as much as MANY older couples.  It was reassuring the OP that she’s not some random exception to the rule that young marriages are bad ideas – many, many, many are not, including my own.  Sorry I offended you with money talk, but pur educations/income are indicators of maturity and responsibility and the foundation of our financially stable situation – some of the many items in a list people say couples need to attain before marriage.  I was simply trying to make the point that not all young couples are jumping in blind sans a plan or any idea about the real world and relating to the OP 🙂

• Sweet_Tea
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: November 1999

@sequinlove:  I married just days shy of my 24th birthday. He turned out to be nothing like I thought he was pre-wedding. He went from being attentive, charming, generous, loving, independent and understanding to clingy, controlling, manipulative, critical, selfish, abusive, and more shortly after the marriage. It was a steady downhill slide that took me some time to figure out, and by the 5th year, I wanted out. I don’t think age was really a factor in this (we were the same age), just a complete personality change.

• LorensAngel
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: August 2013

I’m not divorced (just got married about 4 months ago), but I just want to put my two cents in. I’m one of the youngest bees on this site and I’m normally afraid to post much of anything because bees who marry young get attacked with a wave of “no, don’t do it, you’re doomed” posts. I see the statistics, and my DH and I went into this marriage with the attitude that we want to prove the statistics wrong. Everybody does…no one would get married if they went into it thinking it was only temporary and it would surely end in a messy divorce.

Before DH and I got married, many people were skeptical that we could handle life on our own, and I can definitely see why. But, the point is, we’re handling it. Better than ok. We’re handling it great. We may not have the best of everything, but at least we have it. Our $490 a month apartment is better than a cardboard box, that’s for sure. We’re also managing to pay off my college WITHOUT student loans (yay!) and we have everything we need, plus some that we want. Our lifestyle may not be extravagant, but we’re doing this together and that’s what matters.

I’m not here to be rude, to brag, or to tick anybody off. I just want other younger bees to know that there is hope and young marriage =/= death sentence. I’m sorry to those who have had to go through a divorce. At least through that you learned what you did not want out of a relationship and you learned a lot about yourself. Hugs to you all.

• sostobe
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: February 2015

I wasn’t married in my early 20s.  I was in 2 serious relationships in my 20s.  

I try never to tell anyone they’re ‘too young’ to do anything.  Age doesn’t always mean maturity.  

The bottom line?  You change a lot in your 20s, usually for the better.  You grow, you learn who you are, what you stand for, what your strengths, interests and passions are, and what you want out of life.  I thought I had it all figured out at 21, too.  I had an awesome plan on how my life would go.  The jobs I would get, the money I would earn, the house and children I’d have.  And then I was involved in a catastrophic accident and my life was thrown upside down.  

I’m so far from that ‘plan’ that my 18 – 21 year old self wouldn’t know where to look to find me.  But this life, the one I didn’t plan on, is sooooo much better than I could have ever thought up back then.  Seriously.  The things I’ve done, the places I’ve travelled, the experiences I’ve had… not at all something I thought I’d ever do.  

I’ve changed a lot, beliefs, attitude, goals, aspirations, dreams.  I’m so much more aware of who I am and what I’m capable of doing.  And some of those goals, dreams and aspirations are still the same, the timeline is completely different though.

If you’d have told me any of this before the accident, I would have laughed and said “but everyone always says I’m so mature for my age” and I was.  It didn’t matter.

My hope for those who get married in their early 20s is that they learn to change with their partner and not away from them.  That they manage to guide their relationship through the inevitable changes that come through young adulthood.  And that they accept that their partner will not remain the same person they met at 18, 19, 20 (and that’s a good thing!) I also hope they realize that if they don’t hit every milestone on their plan on their timeline (or at all) that is totally ok.  That’s the life they’re living and I hope they’re able to be float and ride the wave. 

I wonder what my 30s have in store for me.  Considering how much I changed through my 20s.  I wonder if it slows down or if it continues on.  How will I change in the next decade – well, I’ll be a mother eventually for one thing.  How much is THAT going to change me?  And what will becoming a father do to my partner?  How are we going to manage growing and changing together.  We both recognize how different we were from our teens to early 20s, but what strategies are we going to use to keep our relationship strong?  Where will the next 10 years take us?  

I have learned to throw life plans out the window.  I have goals, things I want to achieve, but I’ve learned there’s usually multiple paths to get to those goals and if one shuts down or there’s a roadblock, I just have to find another path.  

• kayjay612
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: February 2015

Im 25 and not yet married.. HOWEVER…

My Nan (mums mum) married 1962 at age 18 … still happily married today (3xdaughters, 11grandkids and 4xgreatgrandkids) 

My grandma (dads mum) married 1960 at age 19 .. still happily married today (8x children, 19grandkid and 10xgreatgrandkids)

My mum and dad married 1983 at age 18 and 20 … celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary last week (4xkids and 4grandkids)

My older sister married 2004 at age 18.  Still happily married  (3xchildren) 

My younger sister married 2011 at age 21 and gave birth to her first child this week!!

 

I asked both my grand mothers what has made their marriages last all these years and they BOTH said 

“Never give up when times are tough!!”  

 

I hope to live by this when I get married 

 

I think every relationship is different and relationships end for many different reasons.. I hope to live by my 

• dsurdam123
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: August 2015

@208bride:  wow. Rude. There are many people who “have their shit together” in their 20’s and make a CHOICE not to get married young so they can experience life in a different way. For someone who doesn’t want to be judged for being young, you’re certainly jumping at the chance to judge others. Hmmm, maybe you still have some growing up to do yourself?

• 208bride
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: September 2014

@KatB442:  This entire post was about people who DO get married young and why these marriages fail and the stereotypes/judgment surrounding them – not about people who are choosing to wait.

 

Please note I didn’t talk about that at all …..  I am in no way saying marrying young is the only good route to take and I didn’t mean pass judgment on people who are waiting for marriage at all.  All I said was that compared to my friends, I have my shit together, and that’s an assessment I made not based on my impending marital status (OR THEIRS) but by my overall stage in life.  They’re not wrong for being at the stage they are at, by ANY means, but it’s one reason why I’m confident about getting married young is because I’m NOT at the stage they’re at.

 

My whole thing is that “just too young” isn’t really a valid reason for a marriage failing.  There are SO many other factors at play, and so I was trying to express to the OP that if you have X, Y, and Z checked off the list, and you just haven’t blown out 25 candles yet, your marriage isn’t doomed.  Clearly I did not express it well enough holy wow.

 

• dsurdam123
• 7 years ago

• Wedding: August 2015

@208bride:  thank you for taking the time to clarify.  I will add one more thing, being ready to marry is not about how many candles are on your cake.  I agree with you there.  But it is about way more, so much much more, than checking items off of a list.  For me, I think this is where you go wrong with your post.  For me, it seems you have a checklist that makes someone ready for marriage and it appears to include money and education.  I think your list may be too short.  Or alternatively, maybe stating your point in a different way that doesn’t come across judgementally and shallow would help people see what you are really trying to sayWithout getting stuck on the details that maybe don’t matter.