Hey All,

I've known this girl for 5 1/2 months and I really like her. I have never wanted to ask anyone to marry me, only I want to ask her. The details... She is 40, she has 3 children, she has her tubes tied, she is renting a place in a ritzy part of town. She has indicated an interest in having a child with me. I am remodeling my house and it will be done in about 2 years and will be a really nice place when I'm done, but she has indicated she wouldn't want to live in this area because she doesn't want to raise her kids here in Saint Paul, and would rather raise them in Maple Grove living in a rental.

I don't always particularly care for this area either, but moving would be done on my dime, as she is penniless and by the time we would move, she'd be another couple years older.

I also hate the fact she is 30 miles away and I only get to see her a couple times a week, so I'm really kind of torn up. If I ask her to marry me, where we live will be an issue, only it will be too difficult for me to finish everything here in a big hurry, and if we wait too long, her childbearing becomes more and more risky.

I've read some of the stuff on this site and resolving conflicts by compromising is certainly palpable, i.e. we could move to a neutral location, but the trouble is I can't do that for about 2 years due to the scope of my project.

She would probably be cool with dragging it out for two years, but I'm not liking that plan a bit. If we did that, in two years, she'll tell me no on the childbearing.

Any advice is welcome. Why can't life be simpler?

You don't really share some of the information that might make it possible for somebody to offer any really good advice.

Where you live isn't really that important. What's going to be important is the blended family. What about her kids? How old? Are they taking a liking to you? What about her children's father? Things all good there? Is it an XH? IN which case how do you feel abotu the fact she may have to interact with him over child issues? Are you planning on adopting if the father isn't there anymore?

Then there's the whole issue of the cost of undoing the ligation, whether or not the two of you can even get pregnant in the first place. And if her kids are ready to have a potential much younger sibling, or if they would handle it well.

And then of course, are you ready to be a parent right after marriage? Blended families are enormously more complicated than normal (heh, what's normal?) families, so you have additional stress and pressure there.

I dont' see where you put your age in, so if there s a big variation there, then that brings a whole new set of dificulties.

What have the two of you done for premarital counseling? How's your conflict resolution stuff? Communicate well? 5 and a 1/2 months at 2x week isn't exactly a whole lot of contact. Have you guys taken a weeks vacation together as a group and seen how that goes? Religious compatibility in terms of beliefs?

So to be frank, I don't get the feeling from what you've posted as to whether or not you're looking at the right issues. IF everything is perfect, then where you live makes no difference, you can have a great blended family in a rusty shack with no plumbing. Not easy, but it can be done. But that's just my gut call based on the very limited info you posted.

Dude,

If I was you date, date some more, date some more and then possibly get married.

First a girl is not 40 she is like 18, 19 maybe even in the twenties.

Second, your not even married yet and she is already dictating to a degree where you should live, without really taking into considerations the cost and expense and even to some extent your dreams.


Third do you really want to attend a childs highschool graduation when you are 60? The chance of having a child born with very serious medical issues are approaching the 40th percentile.

Fourth, I do means half.

I wish you the best of luck.