One who wasn’t sure yet. Maybe he could have ended it a couple of months earlier if he knew he still wouldn’t be sure but life isn’t clean that way.
I’m glad I never had to deal with dating. My best friend became my life partner in a matter of weeks. We still waited four years because we were young (19 years old) and understood the risks. But I can’t imagine what it would be like to date someone you weren’t sure you wanted to marry. I was a little extreme though, I distinctly remember in grade school kicking guys to the curb who were not marriage material. It’s not that I intended to marry them anytime soon, but why waste my time if we clearly were not a lifetime match?
I was a weird kid. I still had ridiculously high standards in college, but somehow, that man freakin’ met them. Highly intelligent, compassionate, funny, great conversation partner, gentle, safe, stable, reliable with the ability to manage a high degree of responsibility, ambitious like myself, interested in an egalitarian partnership and engaged fatherhood, everything you could ask for. It took us a while to realize we were in love (seems everyone else realized it first), but once that realization hit, it was commitment for life.
Exactly. I would think that most guys would walk away from her, and that she’s fine with not wasting time on them. And in those cases, neither one is an asshole, they just aren’t compatible.
I might have expected her to wait for the second date. Why bother even suggesting marriage if you don’t hit it off. And i think the situation would be really weird if they didn’t discuss marriage between that first date and the two year mark. But this, as mentioned above, is social media click bait. If it’s true, it’s leaving out a lot of details.
This. After dating for 3 months, we discussed marriage and even made suggestions about possible wedding dates. Got officially engaged after dating for 2 years and 5 months. Got married 11 months after that.
To date someone for 2 years and never have a discussion about the future is unusual, especially if both parties are out of school.
If they didn’t discuss it in two years then she’s a crazy person. People say lots of things on first dates, most of them nonsense. You can’t expect a guy to remember what they said two years later.
Woah. When I was in school I was just wishing any boy at all would be interested in me. And at university, when miraculously some actually were, I didn’t believe in doing bourgeois stuff like marriage and children, so that wasn’t a consideration. I wanted someone I was compatible with, but I didn’t have any particular plans for the future, and I didn’t think a relationship wasn’t worthwhile if you weren’t sure it would be permanent.
If I’d ended up staying with the first guy I had a relationship with, it would have been nice in some ways, but I would have felt like I missed out in terms of experiences, so I’m glad that didn’t happen. Also, my husband is younger than me, so I definitely would not have been dating him at 18, lol.
Fortunately I didn’t have to do ‘proper’ dating either; it was just getting together with someone I was already friends with, or a guy I already knew socially. Dating apps look like a very unpleasant experience, and quite a slog to find someone you actually like. I have one friend who found his wife that way, but it took him a long time and a lot of trying.
I’m glad you found each other.
When I saw this discussed on Twitter, I was surprised how many people thought it was fine and good to have this sort of deadline, and to break up with a partner because they didn’t meet it. I would have thought it was crazy when I was younger, and two years not enough. But I can see how it makes sense if marriage is your goal, and especially if you want kids.
Seems quite a few people here agree too.
I was also surprised by how many people said they knew they wanted to marry their spouse with months, if not weeks, if meeting them. Apparently that’s more common than I thought.
My wife and I dated five years; I dated another girl two. Marriage never came up with the second. I’m not sure about the first. I don’t remember talking about it in the first two years, but I’m sure around three and a half it came up. We were both in our 30s. (To be fair, she was in the midst of a Ph.D., so may not have been her top priority, and it’s possible it was mentioned in passing, and I just don’t remember it.) My brother dated his girlfriend twelve years. But they were quite young when then met and I don’t know what discussions they had, but we all just assumed they would marry. (Or otherwise be together, but they’re both Catholics with family pressure to get married, so married it was.)
As for the OP taken at face value: fair enough. Guys don’t have that child-rearing years ticking as loudly as women, so I absolutely can sympathize with a “shit or get off the pot” attitude. It’s a bit much for a first date, but at least it lays the cards out.
I assume that, having been issued an ultimatum like that on the first date, the guy just decided to hang around for a couple of years to see if she meant it. “Well I’ll be…”
So, I’m of many thoughts, but I’ll discard the ones about how factual it is.
First, if the woman (or man, no issue if the sexes were reversed in the roles) wants to mention their long term (and two years is reasonably long term for the apparent age group) wants, then that’s fine. If I had sufficient chemistry with my dating partner, I’d at least consider it, though otherwise, it would probably be a “nice date, but I don’t think we’re going to match, good luck!”.
(FTR - my wife and I met in college, were exclusively dating for the last two years, and moved in together after. We lived together for about four years, then got engaged and married)
Anything after that though I can’t pass judgement because of the many, Many unknowns. How old are they, how financially secure, and all of the other real world scenarios that may have left the partner unwilling or unable (from their POV) to make that jump. I’m reminded of my younger brother, the doctah, who during his residency had just about enough energy to eat and collapse. Or if they were military, or lacked the financial stability, or were too focused on their immediate career.
Or their partner (the one making the ultimatum) may have made additional demands, like having kids immediately after marriage, or wanting to be a housewife, or any number of other factors that the partner wasn’t ready for.
A marriage shouldn’t be forever if both parties aren’t happy and wanting to work for it, but it also shouldn’t be entered into easily. If both parties weren’t getting what they wanted, I’m more-or-less glad that they figured it out and went their own ways, hopefully with some degree of respect and affection for each other, and find partners that better suit their wants and hopes.
But without knowing more, I’m not going to pass judgement on either party, nor am I going to care all that much.
A few people have mentioned this. I’m interested in whether people think it’s reasonable to have a deadline and communicate that to a partner, on the first date or otherwise, or whether they think it’s a red flag or something. And is two years long enough to know whether you want to marry someone? For those who are or have been married, how long did it take to know you wanted to marry your partner?
I’m really not bothered whether the story is true or not.
It’s completely reasonable to have a deadline and communicate that on the first date just like any other expectation. It is equally reasonable to decline a second date for not agreeing to the deadline.
I had a pattern of either 1 date and knowing the other person was absolutely not what I wanted (I called them 1 date wonders) or dating for about two years. But it was never a hard and fast deadline with me.
My husband and I were together about two years before we decided to get married. Which we did at about the 2 1/2 year point. But like I said, none of this was a hard and fast deadline with me.
There are so many things that she could have said, & depending upon how she said them I could see someone taking it as a red flag or as just a comment of what they want.
- I always envisioned being married by age {current+2}
- I hope to be married at age {current+2}
- I will be married by age {current+2}
- I think two years is the right amount of time to be dating before marriage.
also, once they started dating did she (repeatedly) bring that two year timeframe up again?
Not enough details for me to be sure, but I’m leaning towards she’s perfectly reasonable, and it’s good to be up front about these things.
I took it as the last one except it was a proposal after two years. I would expect at a minimum she brought it up at the two year anniversary and gave an ultimatum.
I knew right away I wanted to marry my husband.
We married 6 months after our first date.
I agree with this, and also, i think that if both parties are ready to marry, two years is plenty of time to decide if this person is suitable.
When we were dating, my future wife said something along the lines of “I’m getting married this year. If it’s not you, it’ll be some other guy.”
I didn’t take it literally, of course. What she meant was “I’m not getting any younger and I want someone who is interested in making a permanent commitment. If that’s not you, then you’re wasting my time.”
I have X totally blocked, so the OP’s cite is two large blank boxes for me. But by now, with 39 posts ahead of me, I’ve got the outline of the scenario. And further, the specifics of what’s almost certainly exaggerated (or fully fake) clickbait don’t matter. The big picture is having a time line to get serious or get gone.
Having a timeline in general terms is good. Ambushing your mate is not.
A few months ago my then-GF of 11 months and I called it quits. No anger, just mutual sadness that the immovable obstacles we knew about from the git-go weren’t going to move no matter how much we wished for it or worked towards it. One can only keep a’wishin’ and a’hopin’ so long.
I have a friend in his late 50s who’s in a 5-year relationship with a woman where they also have a set of seemingly immovable obstacles. Different in detail from my / ex-GF’s set, but just as significant. Neither are great communicators. He’s been deliberately kicking that can down the road for at least 4 years. Recently she’s become increasingly hostile and demanding about “marry or split.” So he split a month-ish ago.
There is nothing about this split-up that I didn’t predict 4-1/2 years ago when I first met her alongside him. They are both decent and reasonable people; no wackos here. He, and certainly she, would have been far better served to have acknowledged they were aiming at very different targets from the git-go.
I have applied the learning from both of these scenarios to my current GF of about 4 months now. We talked frankly of our long term goals and broad outlines of timelines real early. If not on date 1 it was date 2. Our goals are similar and our obstacles are few and temporary on a scale of months, not years or decades. That seems like a smarter way to play the game.