I lived the classic American tale, met my college sweetheart, had a good relationship for 7 years, got married and stayed together for 10 more. We had two beautiful daughters and never cheated on each other to the best of my knowledge. Good jobs, great house, all of it. Nightmare!!! This isn’t about me though.
I have only known a handful of long-term marriages that I would describe as successful overall in the ideal way. Most say they are until you get to really know one of the ones involved and the truth comes out, affairs get exposed, or one of them gets led off by police on felony charges.
Yet, I see recently divorced people say they aren’t sure about ever doing it again and there they are at the alter less than five years later.
Why? What is your take on why people keep doing it? It seems like a bad economics experiment with all risk and no reward to me. There is no reason to get the courts involved with an infatuation even if it lasts for a while.
I don’t get it either Shags, I’ve been married once, I wouldn’t do it again, that was that for marriage. It seems trite to go back in there saying the same things you said before, in fact although I’ve been happily separated from my husband for about 12 years, we’re still married. Frankly I’m not going to marry anyone else, so why even bother with the divorce?
I was married once around the age of 20 (to the first guy who said the “L” word because I thought he would be the only one to say it) and divorced by 25. That was over 20 years ago and I am finally getting to the point where I would like to do it again – but only once more. I’ve enjoyed being single but would really like to grow old with someone and share in the rest of life’s adventure.
I’m once of those people who thrive more with someone than I do alone.
'Cause it seemed the right thing to do.
And 17 years later, I daresay I was brilliantly correct. It was the correct thing to do, and still is. Intaglio is the perfect obverse to my reverse.
Not that many get it this right. But hell yeah, I’d do it again. Only sooner.
After ten years of living together, it became clear that he wasn’t going anywhere (nor was I), so we figured we might as well tie the knot if for no other reason than it’s simpler to have the same last name. Nothing says “commitment” better than being on your third shared house and moving across the country together.
We’d been living together for about ten years, had a house together and planned on never getting married, but then she needed health insurance so we got married to get her on the plan. She kept her own last name.
Now that she has her own health insurance, I think it would be funny to get divorced, but leave everything else the same, just to piss some of my relatives off.
Because one day she looked at me and said ‘Can we set a date so my mother shuts up?’ To me, it was a minor formality of what already existed. We were married in all but the legal document sense of the word, so whatever.
As for would I do it again, probably. I’m going through a divorce right now, but even so, I don’t regret getting married. I regret what it evolved into, but I don’t regret actually getting married. I doubt I will actively seek out marriage, but if in the future I end up in a relationship that is essentially marriage anyway and it’d make her happy to formalize it, I’d go along with it.
Both times for benefits. First time in 1960 because the USAF gave considerable benefits to married enlisted airmen and their families. That ended when my enlistment ended. There was a lot of this back then.
Second time in 1985 for similar but much more nuanced reasons. Health care benefits were the most obvious but there are all the reasons that the current gay marriage advocated want too. This marriage is now in its 25th year.
I was married for 9 years and it ended badly. I’ve been with my current BF for over two years now and he has talked about marriage. To me, it’s just a legality. It doesn’t make your life any different if you have the piece of paper or not. But maybe I’m just biased because my marriage ended like it did.
We bought a kitchen table together. It seemed kind of silly to be buying expensive furniture if we were just girlfriend/boyfriend, so I proposed. That was 14 years ago. I suspect we’ll be together until one of us dies.
The first time because I was pregnant and it was 1964. The second time because we got along great, really great (still do). We could have just kept living together but there were some economic advantages to being married.
But I wouldn’t do it again. Another husband would have to be my age, and my husband is the only old man I know who I’d want to spend more than five minutes with. (There are a lot of cranky old farts out there!)
Beautifully spoken, and my thoughts exactly. But there will be no more for me: if something happens to him, I do not want to marry again. He is absolutely perfect for me in every way, and I don’t think that will ever happen again.
I think social pressure is a huge part of why a lot of people do it. I have started to notice some half-joking pressure for me to marry my long-term boyfriend. There have also been situations where it was clear that people didn’t take our relationship seriously just because he goes by the title boyfriend rather than husband even though I know of married couples who don’t get along half as well or take things half as seriously as we do. If nothing else, I feel like I should marry him before we have kids because it just seems like the right thing to do.
I always wanted a husband and family. I want to have people to love… I want a house full of happy chaos. The security of having another adult to help you through problems is nice, too.
Something in the pit of my stomach wouldn’t accept a domestic partner arrangement (since I’m lucky enough to be straight). The fact that there is another level of commitment to aspire to would always make me wonder why we weren’t moving on to it. Of course, I always wanted kids. I think that if I didn’t, I may have very different feelings about the whole thing. But then, I wouldn’t be me anymore, either.
My husband was married before. He wanted the same things I did. Turns out she didn’t. When they finally cut loose, he started looking for the things he wanted again.
It’s my 22nd wedding anniversary in September, our eldest child will be 22 in December…
The marriage will last until one of us dies, if he goes first I will not remarry. I think marriage is about children and I’m not having any more (I hope).