Do you think that someone should get married after being together 10 years?

Question

Or why mess with something thats working?

Answer 1

I guess it would depend on the honest answer to the question of why they are not married after ten years...

I have seen too many beautiful young women wait it out thinking that someday their boyfriend will ask them -- but um, why would they if they are having all the benefits already?

My advice to them is --if you really want to get married, give him a timeline to ask you (the longer you've been together, the shorter the timeline, hmm, 10 years=maybe 2 weeks). If he asks you, then he was going to ask you, but if he doesn't, then he never was going to... so after the "deadline" if he doesn't propose you have to BREAK UP. But, the breakup can be a WAKE up, and in the couple of cases where I have advised this strategy, the guy came back soon with a ring and a proposal.

But then, the same strategy has to be used for making this commitment phobe set a date...

But sadly, in one case, the guy did not propose, so the girl broke up with him. 2 months later, he was engaged to someone else, proving that it wasn't that he didn't want to get married, just didn't want to get married to her.

I firmly believe in this technique.

But be aware I have advised this on some conditions -- the girl has been with the guy for a very long time and wants to get married, but for some lame reason, he doesn't think the timing is right.

And, although I think long-term relationships have a certain level of commitment and can work pretty well, I am operating from the bias that marriage is the truest and deepest commitment level, because it is LEGALLY binding.

Decide what you want--do you want to live together the rest of your life with or without being married.

By the way, one responder may be wrong, in a legal sense. You are not necessarily common law husband and wife. In the US, state laws vary on that depending both on length of time in the same household, and also whether or not you are each publicly calling one another husband and wife.

Answer 2

It's really completely irrelevant what other people think you should do - what do YOU think you should do? That's the question you have to answer. What do you both WANT to do?

If you've no wish to alter the present situation, why are you posing the question at all? What has changed, or what do you think might change in the foreseeable future in your present relationship that prompts you to ask it? If it has worked well and continues to work happily for both of you over the past ten years, why does the question of marriage arise at all?

Something must have changed, or perhaps you are thinking of a major change of some sort that makes you ask. If it is because you feel being married would make the relationship more stable or permanent, is that because you are now feeling less sure that you/your partner is as completely committed as used to be the case? If so, let me assure you that if you enter marriage without resolving this doubt, it won't work, and you'll end up with a broken relationship.

Only you know the reason and only you can say why the idea of marrying has arisen. But if it's anything at all to do with a concern about a lessening of commitment, don't even think of it. It's not the outward and public forms of the marriage service, the legally binding Marriage License signed by you both that will serve to keep you together. It's the depths of commitment by both parties to making it work.

Many couples who have lived happily together for years find that they part within a short time after formally tying the knot. They identify the fact of having gone through this procedure as the cause of their break up. It has nothing to do with it. The formal, public legality changes nothing in terms of the likely endurance and strength of the relationship at its heart. That is something that has to be continually nurtured and worked at by each party to it throughout their lives if it is to succeed and prosper, formally and legally bound or not.

I am answering as one who believes in marriage as means whereby a relationship between a couple receives formal recognition by the state of a specific legal status, and by society as a customary rite of commitment to one another that grants them a particular status and recognition in that society. Both are true, but it is always a relationship between two people. If that irrevocably breaks down, then formally, legally and socially recognised or not, the relationship fails.

Put simply, getting married, going through the formalities and customs, establishing your relationship in law is not a guarantee that it will endure and prosper. But neither have these formalities any role in dooming it to failure. The outcome is entirely the responsibility of the partners in the relationship in either case.

So I repeat - what prompts your question after 10 years together? You yourself say: "Why mess with something that's working?" What's the reason you are even considering it?

wimsey

Answer 3

Some people just don't like the idea of marriage. However it's a free country and they have the right to be together unmarried if they so chose, many straight couples live together for years without marrying, the only difference here is sexual orientation.

Answer 4

Why would marriage mess up your relationship? I married my husband after 12 years of being together and our relationship has not changed except that we now wear wedding bands. I still love him the same. Legally things will change, but that should be it. If you guys want to get married, get married, if not, don't. Do what will make you happy.

Answer 5

My aunt married her first husband after 18 years of living together. They would have probably never got married, if it had not been for the fact my grandfather was dying, and he never agreed with them not being married. And then her husband got sick just before they got married also. And died 6 months later. If they hadn't of gotten married my aunt would have lost the house that she helped pay for because it was his.
Marriage has its benefits, and if the other person legally owns most of the things you share such as your home, if something happens to them. Their family has the right to it, not the girl friend/boy friend. Even with a will it can be contested.

Answer 6

Well I would say its according to what there is offered and what the two of you have together now... Most people in a relationship for ten years have a common law marrige in place.. Good luck I would check with a lawyer... What if the other dies? Is there and way to collect on their SS? How about insurance? Are you the benificiary? etc... Grant M from Pennsylvania

Answer 7

I don't see the point of getting married. May I add it's a drag for family to go to a wedding of people who've been together for 10 years. It's often view as a way of getting gifts and money only.

Answer 8

There are a lot of legal protections that you get from being married. Eg. if your partner were to get in a car accident and be taken to the hopital right now, you would not even be allowed to see them, the doctors would not even tell you how he/she was doing because you have no legal relationship. So that is one reason to get married if you intend to stay together.

Answer 9

Should? No. I don't think that marriage will mess up something that is working, but I don't think that getting married is necessary for commitment or if you want, having children.

Answer 10

That is up to both parties. If they want to get married than that is fine. If they don't want to then don't if they want to then go ahead. People have said marriage ruins things. However if you live together before hand and then you know what to expect it shouldn't ruin anything. If you love each other than nothing should ruin it for you. do what makes you happy.