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Joined: May 2001
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Speaking from experience of a marriage that lasted only 3 years, I must say that I would never consider living together with my girlfriend at any cost.

Living together may seem convenient and fun, but if you are looking at developing a long term relationship or marriage with someone, I would strongly suggest against it! I am in my 20's and I find many of my friends shacking up for a variety of reasons. None of the reasons I have heard will actually benefit their relationship in the long run!

If you really want to find out what "living" with a person would be like, take 1-2 years and really get to know them. Its a much less painful way to determine compatibility..

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Your firsthand knowledge is backed up by studies that confirm your assertion.

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Highly Agree with you. From my own experiences, found that being friends first, allowing the friendship to grow, then it catches on fire at some point, then it becomes a "relationship" of a romatic nature. It is that willingness of the two parties then, to allow the romance to grow into courtship, then marriage. As long as you keep the sex factor out of it, the emotional part of the relationship grows better over time.

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Thanks Much!

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Hi positivebryan,

I just happened to read your message. First of all, I'm so sorry that your marriage ended, especially so soon. What interested me was,why your marriage ended so soon. When did it start going bad?
I ask because I just got married this past summer to my boyfriend of 10 years (we lived together for several of those years). I'm starting to think it was a mistake to get married. I don't feel like I feel the love I'm supposed to feel for him. We've talked about a few problems we have and have talked them to death - but - nothing changes. It seems as if he's too lazy to try to fulfill my emotional needs. We even filled out the questionnaire, etc. and discussed how each of us could meet our emotional needs. That was several months ago. And recently I confronted him with this topic, and explained that I didn't feel like my needs were being met, and he replied after thinking silently for a long time, "I'm sorry, I guess I just didn't think about it. I guess I forgot and lost my focus."

I feel like I made a big mistake, and I notice myself already noticing other men and longing for them. Even if I don't find them outwardly attractive! I just NEED someone who will give me what I need. I feel miserable.

I know you can't possibly give me an answer, but I anyway, I was just wondering what makes some marriages that end so soon.

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oops, I forgot ..
You know, I feel so lonely and miserable. We don't have sex at all either, even though I've expressed my sexual desire. And I've expressed also that I kind of can't just jump into it (without foreplay) and he refuses to NOT just jump right in. He tends to like to 'hit on me' while I'm blow-drying my hair, or paying bills, you know, doing something that is actually quite stressful. When I say that I need a little time before having sex to relax, to feel sexy, etc., he just ignores me. We talked about this before the marriage. I should have known things wouldn't change.

Anyway. I feel like wanting to get out of this fast - and definitely do not yet want children with him. But on the other hand, I feel like maybe I'm just giving up on him too fast, and not taking the institution of marriage seriously enough. But, I'm 30 years old and do not want to keep wasting my time on a relationship that might not even be right.

Oh, sorry for this long mail. I'm terribly confused, as you can see.

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cumlee...

The reason for my marriage ending was an affair that my wife was involved in and her reluctancy to seek help with or without me. She was also very bad in handling our finances, but continuing to spend money like crazy.

I am very sad to hear about your situation. Are there any children involved??? If not, I would strongly suggest that both of you seek marital help asap.

You are exactly the same age as me and I couldn't imagine living in a marriage without the mutual bonding needed to make the marriage strong.

Did your husband suddenly change in any way after the marriage???? If you can provide more specifics, I will be able to help you more.

write back soon..

Thanks
Bryan

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My SO and I live together 4 days a week. I love the time with him and I love the time away.

It's a plan that works for us for now.

If/when we get married my expectations will be very different. We've spoken about that and have begun working on making the changes slowly.

I have to wonder what went tragically wrong in 4 short months to end PB's marriage. I somehow get the feeling that it was something more than just living together.

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Katie..

I was married for over 2 1/2 years....It was 4 months between dday and the divorce being final. If you live together 4 days a week, why aren't you both married at this point???

I would strongly recommend reading the book, buyers, renters, freeloaders by Dr. Harley. There you will find everything you need to know about cohabitation. I did it...and it was one of the worst decisions ever made...

Wishing you the best!

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We're not married because that is not the goal for us. Our goal is to have a strong relationship. If it leads to marriage fine. If not-not.

<small>[ January 29, 2003, 09:40 AM: Message edited by: Katie Scarlett ]</small>

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After having been married for 17 years you would think I would agree with you on this topic but I don't. I am 38 years old now with 3 grown or almost grown kids. When I met (T) I had been single for about a year. We clicked right away and started a freindship that became very strong.
He lived 50 miles from me so the commute every week back and forth got long. I found a great job near him and we decided to try living together. We have been living together now for about a year and couldn't be happier. We plan to get married in a few months and I really don't see where our relationship could change. We are very very honest about our feelings, our wants and needs and our goals. We have both been through the marriage thing before and I don't think I could have married him before I really knew him and I don't know how I would have gotten to know him this way if I hadn't lived with him.

This is just my story and my opinion.

Jill

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I think, like anything, this issue comes down to here your head is at.

I've watched people move in together and then live like roommated. Get married and have a completely different set of expectations.

It's also true that i've seem people really commit to one another, move in, get married and have a successful marriage.

Saying "you should never live together" is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

JMHO

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Katie..

The percentage of people who shack up and get divorced once they are married is almost twice the divorce rate. What would you do if your daughter was 18 and wanted to live with her boyfriend???

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At 18 it's not my decision.

If he was a good guy I wouldn't have a problem with it.

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The problem I have w/this thread is that it makes a blanket statement in assuming that ALL couples who live together prior to marriage will not have a successful relationship. You can't possibly believe that just b/c statistics say one thing then that will automatically apply to your particular situation. If you live your life like that than I truly feel sorry for you b/c statistics will also tell you that the divorce rate is at 50% and climbing, so that would defeat the argument of getting married vs. living together.

The point is...do what you feel is best for YOUR R. Just b/c one R had a certain outcome does not mean your R will have the same. There are too many different factors that could alter it. If you don't do what you feel is best for you then you'll always live you're life based on what other people feel is best for you. If the R fails, it could just mean that you 2 were not compatible or how you relate to each other is not compatible. How exactly do you correlate the fact that just b/c 2 people lived together prior to M then that's why their M failed. Obviously, there were other factors involved. That just seems like common sense.

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But it IS true that those who live together before marriage have a MUCH higer rate of divorce than those who get married without shacking up first.

Obviously, there are exceptions to this, but why risk it?

I say this out of personal experience, too. I lived with my husband for a year before we got married. We were married for 18 years. When we got divorced (I wanted to stay married...) he told me he "never felt committed."

I guess that is what Dr. Harley is saying about the difference between being married and living together. My husband never was able to make the mental leap from the shacking up mentality to the mentality it takes to have a successful marriage.

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Living together before marriage is fine if both people can and are willing to step up to the plate and have a happy M. Most people don't make that change when they get married. Usually only one spouse makes the change while the other stays with the freeloader or renter attitude.

It is statistically proven that the divorce rate is higher, does that mean all relationships are doomed? No. They are only doomed if one partner does not make that mental change.

For me? I lived with my wife for three years before we got married. Just over a month into our marriage she started her A. She never made the mental change that it takes to be married.

For me, I will not live with another woman before getting married again. Living together is not what doomed our marriage, but I feel it definately was a factor.

STTSI

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I know many marriages that began with spouses that never lived together that have one spouse who is more comitted than the other. I also know many marriages where spouses lived together before they got married and have a deep committment to eachother. I don't think that it is fair to generalize this. There are just to many variables to make a substantiated assumption.

Jill

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Jill et al.,

Dr. Harley estimates that 85% of all post-cohabitation marriages end in divorce, but he also suggests his number is a little speculative.

Of course, if one's already in that situation, one should do everything possible to be in that 15% or so. It's still largely a matter of mutual decision, not only a matter of chance and circumstance.

While the people who choose to cohabit are more likely (purely statistically speaking--individual cases will vary wildly) to be personally predisposed toward lesser commitment and hence divorce, and while the process of cohabitation itself actually inhibits later marital success (this is very surprising to some), it's still in any individual case a matter of choices that each person makes.

(Anecdotally, I know I've seen an extremely high, but not 100% by ANY means, failure rate after cohabitation, and a much lower failure rate after non-cohabitation with serious pre-marital counseling, but I'd certainly defer to those with more expertise, especially if, as in Harley's case, they have a huge amount of experience and common sense, too.)

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Jill..

In reading the posts on this topic...many people have touched on my point regarding cohabitation. Its a fact that 80 plus percent of marriages who do cohabitate end in divorce.

When you live together before you marry, you are setting yourself up for a huge fall. The mind has a difficult time separating the "shack up" and the "marriage building" mindframe. This leads to confusion of what the relationship actually is and leads to the downfall of the relationship.

My question to you is....Why risk this???? You know its no the right thing to do, you know that God doesn't approve of it...etc...etc...

Dr. Harley's book...Buyers, Renters and Freeloaders explains this..

Bryan

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