White Daisy-
Glad to have you back ! How were your holidays and time
away ? Anything new with H ? What are your plans now ?
Looks like you are thinking about marriage in general and
maybe the difference in being friends, "partners", and
married ?
I think people probably have very particular views on this,
based on their upbringing, traditions, culture, religious
views, family, etc. For myself, I know that I was one who,
although I expected I would eventually get married, was not
in a big rush to do so. I had several long-term relation-
ships (over 2 yrs) including an "almost" engagement with
a guy I dated for 6 years. WH and I met through a mutual
friend, and WH lived in another state, so our relationship
started out as a friendship with lots of our getting to
know each other done over the phone, and in short visits to
each other. WH moved here, both to pursue our relationship
and a different job, with him staying with me for awhile,
then getting his own place. Eventually, he moved in with me.
We dated over two years before getting engaged, then got
married 6 mos later. In my family, living together does not
go over very well, and I never intended it to be a long-
term thing, as I would not feel comfortable in just living
together a long time- to me a relationship leads to and is
"culminated" in a marriage. I wanted to be married for
several reasons:
To show my partner my committment, love and devotion, and
my intent to continue with our relationship for life.
For my partner to show me his committment, love, devotion
and his intent to continue our relationship for life.
To be known to the world as a committed couple.
To be married partners if we had children.
To have the legal benefits and protection of marriage.
For my religious beliefs- as a covenant between us and God
showing our devotion and committment to each other.
And because of my family background/upbringing- I am from
a pretty traditional family.
My WH is not religious at all, so he probably wouldn't add
that last reason, but I believe he would agree with the
others as his reason for getting married. (he is from a
very traditional family also).
I need to update my post again, but to give you a quick
update, my WH got a DUI on Christmas ! That put him into
such a bad depression and anxiety, that he finally decided
to get help, and is now under the care of pschiatrist and
counselor, and he was finally evaluated and diagnosed with
bipolar disorder ! (After being on the wrong meds for at
least 5 years, when everyone just treated him for having
depression). He is on different meds now, and in just a
week it's made a huge difference in his mood and also his
personality. He says he and OW have "broken it off" and are
no longer seeing each other, however, I know they are still
talking some on the phone, so it's not a "done deal" yet.
On the more positive side, he has been wearing his wedding
ring again, opened a new joint bank account for us, and
he's asked me to go to all his Dr/psychiatrist/counselor
appointments so far-
Slammed
