I take mine off most of the time, gripping my bicycle bars or apparatus bars at the gym pinches and blisters my finger if I wear the ring.
My wife and I have discussed ditching the rings and getting ring tattoos. After all, we’re permanent, so why not have permanent rings? Plus, I find rings damn uncomfortable, as does she. Nearly 10 years later, and I’m still not really used to it.
Plus there was the little “incident” that happened to me this afternoon:
I was hanging a door back on its hinges. I held it by its sides and with great difficultly I finally managed to get it lined up properly so it could drop into place. Trouble was, my left hand was the one holding the side next to the door frame. My fingers fit in that space, but my ring didn’t. Plus, I’ve put on enough weight since my wedding that my ring doesn’t come off.
Took me 20 minutes to wriggle my way out of that one.
Neither my husband nor my father wear a wedding ring. My wedding set no longer fits so I wear my anniversary ring as a wedding ring. To each his own, I guess.
Okay, I KNOW I just posted a reply to this along the lines of “Don’t do it, relationship-related tattoos of any kind are the kiss of death,” but now it’s not showing up when I came back to see another new post. How bizarre.
Well, I know the Amish as a general rule don’t have wedding rings. But then, they pretty much don’t have any jewelry.
Me, I’m not Amish. I’m not Christian. I’ve also never worn jewelry much, I work a great deal with my hands, including with tools that make wearing rings hazardous, and thus I just opted out of the whole ring thing.
I’ve been married for 20 years, neither of us have worn a ring during those years. Granted, it was even more unusual back then, but it’s hardly this year’s fad.
As a formerly single woman, and a currently married one, it pisses me off no end when I see a man angling to get a look at my left hand. ** ASK ME, DAMMIT! ** Is it really that difficult to speak to a woman? Seriously? WHY do people have to make this more complicated than necessary?
As a corollary - if I state I’m married/unavailable then I’m unavailable. Period. Jokes about “well, how married are you? Hur hur guffaw” will move you permanently into the “wouldn’t date him if he were the last man left alive, would opt for a goat instead” category which, just in case you weren’t clear on it, is worse than the “friend zone”.
Perhaps because they’d feel rude if the exchange were to go something like, “Are you married?” “Yes.” “Nevermind. walks away”
Well, that’s you. Some people *do *have open marriages. Of course, anyone using that particular joke is probably just one of those people who thinks they’re much more clever and funny than they actually are. But still, it makes more sense to be disgusted with them for being morons than for asking the terms of your marriage.
Seventh Day Adventists generally don’t wear jewelry. I think I remember that wedding bands are exempt and allowed (if usually frowned down upon - the Adventists are pretty dogmatic), but there’s certainly lots that don’t wear them. The accepted engagement exchange is a nice watch - if it’s functional, it doesn’t count as jewelry. (Don’t ask me, I just grew up in that church.)
My Dad hasn’t worn a wedding ring in like ever - he’s a doctor and was afraid he’d leave it on the counter after washing up for surgery. Since surgery’s a pretty regular thing for him, he just never wore it. It never upset my mother at all (probably because she knew why he didn’t wear it.)
I have relatives that belong to a Christian Holiness group and they don’t allow jewelry, including wedding rings. So I never saw the point of them and don’t wear one. (I also go one better: I consider a wristwatch jewelry and don’t wear one.)
Wedding rings for the ordinary folk is a relatively new concept and one shouldn’t assume that they are somehow an important legacy of our culture.
I know a couple who have done the wedding-ring tattoo thing.
On the other side of the spectrum, my father says he never takes his off.
I take my engagement ring off to shower and cook.
Because asking a woman you’ve just met if she’s married displays a serious deficiency of tact, and that is something I posess.
I should have titled this "Why do some married couples not wear wedding rings, because that’s what I really was asking.
I wear mine sometimes. If I take it off I forget to put it back on…for months. The singuy doesn’t wear his at all, it got a little tight. Mine is way cooler than his anyway.
(I’m not the one you were asking, but since the question applies to me as well) Why have a wedding at all? Just do a civil ceremony at the court house. My wife and I wanted to have a wedding, and the ring thing is part of the ceremony, so we did it. But I haven’t worn my ring since because I just don’t like wearing rings. It’s really nothing more complicated than that. I told my wife before we got married that I probably wouldn’t wear the ring and she said, “I know”. Funnily enough, absolutely no one that I know, family, friends, co-workers, casual acquaintances, not one person has ever asked me why I don’t wear my wedding ring.
My father didn’t wear his wedding band. I’m 44 and a lot of men when I was a kid, didn’t wear wedding bands. My mum didn’t wear her wedding band, but she had a diamond ring that she wore. I guess it went with the band.
Could’ve added you to the chorus of friends who told me getting my then-fiancé’s name tattooed on my arm was a sure-fire recipe for disaster. Of course, that was over ten years ago, and each of those friends has since gotten married and divorced while my wife and I have a stronger relationship than ever. I’m not particularly worried about it.
Counter-OP:
What’s up with assuming married people must wear a ring?
Not being argumentative, I know there’s a social ‘expectation’ of a ring, but - why?
My wife and I both take off and put back on our rings daily. She works with machinery and if she didn’t leave the rings at home it would be dangerous to her and someone might find a diamond in their package of toilet paper. Mine is tungsten carbide and scratch proof (almost) but I don’t wear it when I am working on things either.
My wedding band is too tight and causes my left hand to get numb and tingly, especially while driving (steering wheel deathgrip?).
But I and the wife do wear ours when we go out together, for some unspoken reason, or we wear them when we’re going out drinking without each other.
Right. But weddings can be personalized, and though it doesn’t vex me, I don’t understand why you just don’t forego that the same way a lot of people forego the “love, honor, and obey” bit. Why include something you don’t like?
Oh, please - you think I don’t know what’s up when you’re looking for a ring on my left hand? Ask “Are you married?”, then I say “Yes”, then you say “Ah, well - I’m looking for a girlfriend.” and I say “Good luck - hope you find one soon.” THEN you walk away. I understand you want to spend your time and energy on someone unavailable, it won’t crush my little feminine ego. It’s the “nevermind”+walk away than says you don’t consider women useful as anything other than sex toys (I’m going to assume you don’t really feel that way, it’s just that’s how it comes across) whereas an extra 30 seconds will allow you to extract yourself from the conversation with grace and tact.
Yes, but most don’t.
And you are correct - it is the “joking” aspect that makes it offensive.
It shouldn’t surprise anyone that the default marriage terms in the western world is monogamy, i.e. NOT open. Now, I tell someone I’m married and they say “Is it an open marriage?” with a slightly hopeful but sincere tone I’m not going to get in a huff. It’s the frackin’ joking crap that ticks me off, like the terms of my marriage aren’t important, it’s just for laffs.
In fact, on occasion I HAVE had polite inquiries as to whether or not my marriage is open, and I responded politely and sincerely in kind. Oddly enough, they were all very direct “Is your marriage open?” rather than “How married are you?” inquiries. Again, asking a direct question frequently gets you a better answer.
It does? Funny, I meet new people all the time, they ask me “Are you married?”, “Do you have children?”, “Do you live around here?” Since when is asking if a woman is married offensive?
Now, asking it while drooling and oogling her secondary sexual characteristics… that’s definitely off. But why would a woman be offended if you ask her whether or not she’s married? I didn’t find it offensive before I was married, I don’t find it offensive now.
Well, OK - the main reason is that neither my husband nor I wear any other jewelry, and we’ve both had jobs where wearing rings were dangerous due to machinery we were using, so we just didn’t see the point in sinking money into rings neither of us were going to wear.
I cant wear mine at work. I could lose a finger.