is marriage important to you?

Question

like would you not start a family until you are married?

me personally have been with my partner 10 years, we have 2 kids, we are not married and have no intention to marry we are very happy i was just wondering what other people think of this

we are not religious so my view is that marrige would be a bit of paper to us it will not make us love each other any more or change anything

i know my partner loves and respects me and i do him nothing wrong with marriage at all

if my partner ever died (touch wood it will not happen till he is very old) i am sure the last thing on my mind would be money, money is not everything and i would never get married for that reason its pathetic

Answer 1

i felt the same way that you do and we lived together for years, had kids, paid bills, went on vacations,etc BUT the only problem was legal.

If anything happened to either one of us and we had to make a life saving choice for the other one...we would not have a leg to stand on. We got married last year, and nothing has changed except that now we can exercise our choices.

Answer 2

I agree and support your decision. Marriage is not important to me at all because I feel that it is a religious ceremony and if you are not in that faith then there is no reason. The other view is legal for monetary reasons. I wouldn't agree with this either b/c commitment is based on love not money or ceremony. In the past i have lost relationships because the other thought i was nuts for seeing things this way, but I have also witnessed many people be together living and happy with children grown up 15+ years together and not even a year after marriage get a divorce. It is sad and not the case for everyone.

To simply answer the question; yes i would start a family without marriage.

And congrats to your beginning family!

Answer 3

At this point marriage would simply be a business choice for the family .
Marriage is a business and investment, but at some point, because of assets and security for your children or if you want rights to make decisions in the event of something serious .Then you have more rights as a spouse.and if he did die, and you didn't receive insurance benefits because you are not legally bound then that would be foolish. Money is not the basis of your commitment but it is important,if not for you then for your kids,
Marriage is over rated to me if it's about love. if you have long term life time goals and are going to jointly commit to the persual of a family unit with a plan for the later years and getting your kids up to the point of college, then marriage is an investment, if their are ex wives or if the guy comes from money and has family and other children, then you should absolutely be married otherwise you may learn first hand how people will get real down and dirty about money, so when you love someone you want to protect them and your children, you can only judge a man's character by the way he takes care of his children and/or parents. but you two discuss the details and the pros's and con's of being hitched or not.

Answer 4

No, not really, but for security reasons yes. I don't think it's the way things should be - see my question "should marriage have any legal status?". For me, marriage is definitely a "contract" to guarantee financial security, either for yourself, or for your partner.

I don't see why I should have to commit my entire life to someone just so that I can reap the welfare benefits. What if I change my mind? Mind you, I can always get a divorce. I just wish that divorces were easier to get!

All this about ruining the sanctity of marriage means nothing if you are not religious. Marriage should be a contract, possibly even renewable. Likewise, childcare should be a contract - both partners should pay for raising children.

If you're not going to get married, you'll have to consider your legal status quite carefully, but I think you should be able to do this if you consult a solicitor. I'd like to try, but sadly, "marriage" looks like the easy way out to secure my future, which is so sad, because I hate the idea of being tied down like that. I wish you the best of luck in your non-married life. But please do consult a solicitor, because even if you don't care about money that much (good for you!) , it still costs a lot of money to raise children.

Answer 5

I am not married nor religious but marriage is a big deal to me, had a partner for 10 years and 3 kids but he wasn't willing to make the commitment in the end it was too much and we were always digging at each other over it.

Answer 6

I'm married but each person/couple is different and that's great. If you two are happy like that then don't do the marriage thing as its not you two. I think marriage is great but like you said its a bit of paper and i have always wanted to get married and same with my hubby. We had one son before we were married and then when our son was 3 we got married and had another a year later. Each couple is different i don't see any difference with married couples with children to unmarried couples with children they both love each other as much.

Answer 7

Same here - me and my man have been togther for 7 years - no kids (only a dog!). No intention of getting married. Nothing against it but we are not religious although, of course, you can always get married in a non religious ceremony. We think, why the hell should we declare in public that we love each other to be taken seriously - don't need to do that and won't be forced to either. I love my life but it never ceases to amaze me how society judges a woman who is 40 with no children and not married - makes my blood boil but makes me more determined not to fall for the hype and conform.

Answer 8

i've been married and divorced twice.

before i met the woman of my dreams, i was very anti-marriage thinking that the institution was dead and unimportant. you can commit to another person without the legal ceremony. but now that i have met the woman of my dreams, i am not sure where we are with it. she also had similar thoughts about it since she has also been through two marriages so it's funny that we're both having second thoughts about it. we might end up committing to each other on our own terms.

Answer 9

i am 37 years old and have had 5 kids and have never been married (4 kids with one man and 5 years later had my last child with another man ) and i see no reason i would ever get married my kids and i are happy with things the way they are

Answer 10

Well, mariage is marriage whether u actually have a formal do or live in with your partner. d responsibilities r all the same. a formal ceremony is more for the society, which would then recognise u as a part of it. and of course all govt benefits can be availed only by that! its a ritual which binds us. if u r happy without that, well kudos!