Should We Get Married? Questions to Ask Before Getting Married

Many if not most dating couples seem to believe that getting married is the natural course of life. You grow up, graduate high school, go to college or get a job, meet and fall in love with Mr. or Ms. Right, get engaged, get married, start a family. Just like that, botta bing botta boom. Even if only one partner wants to get married, the pressure is on to get married anyway and start having babies because well, it just seems to be the natural next step in life. Right?

One of the most alarming questions I have ever received was from a young woman in her mid-twenties asking me to give her advice on how to make her boyfriend propose and marry her, because “he won’t commit”. After I declined to give her a list of things she could do to get a proposal from her boyfriend, she decided the best thing for her to do was to get pregnant on purpose and then propose to her boyfriend.
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Do Men Want To Get Married? Top Ten Reasons Why Men Don’t Want To Get Married

Do men want to get married, or not? “Do Men Really Want to Get Married” is the question being discussed in a CNN article about whether the stereotypical belief that men are dragged off to the altar to get married kicking and screaming is true or not. CNN reporter, Alex Wallen, claims to have interviewed dozens of men on how they approached marriage, where these men admitted that they had “fantasized about popping the question, getting married, even having a wedding.”

Wallen reports that numerous men reported having a “light-switch” moment when they decided they should get married to their significant other. Examples given include a life-altering event, such as one man who suddenly realized his love for his girlfriend when she helped him deal with the death of his father; or it might be something as simple as having so much fun playing arcade games together that you can’t imagine yourself having this much fun with anyone else. One man decided it was time to get married when he became angry and balled-up his fists when another man made a pass at his then-girlfriend.

“Real men are perceived as committing “till death do us part” for the wrong reasons — they marry out of convenience or under duress, and they acquiesce, kicking and screaming all the way to the altar”, according to the article. If recent statistics are correct, men are choosing to marry later in life, with the average age being 28 before experiencing their “ah ha” moment, which is a good thing. Nevertheless, there are still many young men and women getting married too young, and far too many couples get married for the wrong reasons and end up regretting it later.
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