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Three years? Tell him it's time to fish or cut bait.
Of course, your big mistake was moving in with the guy. Basically he gets all the benefits of marriage without all those tedious legal responsibilities.
I think you are spot on.... If a woman's goal is marriage, moving in together is usually a BIG mistake IMO. I'm not sure why more women don't get this. Maybe it works for women who have no desire for formal marriage (e.g. Oprah and Goldie Hawn). She may want to start looking at other housing options.
The thing that I don't understand is: Why start this thread if there is no issue? This had to bother the OP on some level, she took the time to post it here.
Sure it bothered her. She did not get the joyful acceptance she was hoping for. She was hurt and confused.
However, it is an insane leap to say that because something bothered her she is being taken advantage of by a guy who is simply settling for her because he cannot get sex elsewhere, needs her money, and only barely tolerates her kids. So she should leave him.
Where is the logic in that?
Human relationships are complicated and messy. They simply do not follow the fairy tale path of boy meets girl, boy chastely dates girl, boy proposes, girl accepts, marriage, sex, white picket fence, 2 kids and a dog.
Here we have a guy who dated her for over 2 years then asked her and her kids to move in with him. They trust each other enough to mix finances. They are refinancing the house (or maybe buying another??), which will allow her to build equity in the real estate. He has talked about adopting the kids, but this is apparently not possible because of the kids father. Wow. I want these people to be my neighbors.
There are all sorts of reasons why the guy would not accept the marriage proposal. Maybe his parents got a really messy divorce and the thought of marriage horrifies him? He may view marriage as an outmoded social institution. Maybe he is a traditionalist and wanted to do the proposal himself, and was put off a bit by her doing it first.
We simply do not know.
What we do know is that she was annoyed by one interaction with him, but is happy with him in regards to many, many other issues. Then a bunch of puritanical posters get it in their heads that if a relationship is not marriage, the woman is being taken advantage of, and she should have kept her legs closed until the preacher pronounced them man and wife.
In summary, she seemed a bit bothered and people are telling her to take a chainsaw to her relationship. Lets all have a bit of perspective here.
I think you are spot on.... If a woman's goal is marriage, moving in together is usually a BIG mistake IMO. I'm not sure why more women don't get this. She may want to start looking at other housing options.
Exactly the point most of us are trying to make.
Again, women frequently make these kinds of poor choices, usually out of fear of losing the guy
Now we have to listen to post after post where she elevates him to sainthood in order to live with the fact that he "rejected her proposal".
Maybe lying to themselves in public rather than in private works better for some... We should provide the necessary therapy without much questioning! We're bad people!
OP-I'm sorry you went through that humiliation. But the truth is that if you haven't figured out in 3 years if you want to marry someone, it more than likely isn't going to happen. It sounds like your wasting your time with him as he's not ready or it just isn't YOU he wants to marry.
I hope you find what you're looking for eventually. GL
I wonder about it, too. I think deep down they know an ultimatum will not work and they choose to get the crumbs from the table because otherwise the whole table will be taken away from them and they can't live with that. I believe on some level they do understand they're not the guy's first choice and he's just killing time being with them until something better comes along, and should they start making waves, he'll leave. He’ll probably do that sooner or later anyway… Women tend to prolong the agony in all kinds of situations. I’m no stranger to that myself.
Again, women frequently make these kinds of poor choices, usually out of fear of losing the guy
My sister had a similar story. She moved in with a guy after college whom she wanted to marry. After a few years living together, he admitted that he didn't want to get married (he had been divorced) but wanted to keep cohabitating (it was all so perfect for him LOL).
So my sister promptly moved out and broke it off. She was an emotional wreck for several months as they truly did love each other. They ended up getting back together and he proposed. They are now a happy middle aged married couple with 2 kids. I think there is a lesson to be learned here.
My sister had a similar story. She moved in with a guy after college whom she wanted to marry. After a few years living together, he admitted that he didn't want to get married (he had been divorced) but wanted to keep cohabitating (it was all so perfect for him LOL).
So my sister promptly moved out and broke it off. She was an emotional wreck for several months as they truly did love each other. They ended up getting back together and he proposed. They are now a happy middle aged married couple with 2 kids. I think there is a lesson to be learned here.
I've heard of other scenarios just like that. IMO, cohabitation brings all the disadvantages of singlehood and marriage to women, and all the advantages - to men; hence, men love those limbos.
My sister had a similar story. She moved in with a guy after college whom she wanted to marry. After a few years living together, he admitted that he didn't want to get married (he had been divorced) but wanted to keep cohabitating (it was all so perfect for him LOL).
So my sister promptly moved out and broke it off. She was an emotional wreck for several months as they truly did love each other. They ended up getting back together and he proposed. They are now a happy middle aged married couple with 2 kids. I think there is a lesson to be learned here.
Good for your sister!
She had to be willing to be true to herself, at the risk of losing the man she loved, in order to get what she knew she wanted out of life
The last few posts have been from a bunch of haters. Why go there?
This woman sounds like she has thought things through and has a good relationship with this man. They are pretty equally matched financially, they agree on the children, and things have worked out pretty well for 3 years.
Now we have people absolutely trashing his motives and her judgement based upon a handful of short posts?
As I see it, there is only one issue here, and that is that he is being deliberate and thinking things through on the marriage front. There are lots of benefits. Why trash some guy you do not even know and sow the seeds of discord with the OP?
Don't you get it. It's so typical of C/D or anywhere else on the web. It's like the internet armchair therapist opiniomania. They would clamour for the OP to pick up her bags and leave the man, just becoz the internet therapististas thought so with such precision that it defies internet physics. If not, there will be fire and brimstone
The advice I gave you is MORE important than your life just becoz I'm an unpaid, unthanked, unrepped, un-repcommented and bored i-clairvoyant
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