Did or do HS sweethearts not realize there are other fish in the sea?

[QuietRiot]

When I graduated high school, I left, did the military and college thing, and came back in my mid-20s.  After that, I took a few community college courses, and it appeared that most women between 18 and 25 were engaged or married. Some already had kids. At the time, I couldn't help but to think how can anyone think that the only person they ever were involved in high school, or anyone in general, with would be "the one" for them? I mean, why not explore your options when you head off to college? Didn't it occur to them that there other fish in the sea?  I was just curious.

I remember one time, I was talking to a friend of mine, and we mentioned a couple that were seniors in high school. Knew them through geek circles. Found out they were marrying as soon as they both graduated high school. I was like "Wow, you know, couples that marry THAT young, typically those marriages don't last, statistically" I knew this for a long time, but I couldn't help but wonder why the urgency to marry your high school sweet heart, and not just experience independence as an adult?

[d0nnivain]

Some people like the romance & security of it all.   I actually have 2 friends who married their college sweethearts.  Both marriages are still going strong 25+ years later.  It can happen but it is unusual.  Most HS sweethearts I knew broke up in college.  I have many friends still happily married to their college sweethearts but probably an equal # who are divorced.   DH was in the military.  The bulk of his brothers met their wives before they were 20 & all but 2-3 are still married.

[stillafool]

I have friends who married right out of high school and are still together and happy.  Some people are fortunate to find their soul mate young.

[QuietRiot]

7 minutes ago, stillafool said:

I have friends who married right out of high school and are still together and happy.  Some people are fortunate to find their soul mate young.

Yeah, it is kind of amazing that they are still together after all these years....usually young couples start getting the itch when they hit around 30 lol As typically their minds haven't yet matured fully.

[stillafool]

Well I'm sure they've had their issues just like other couples but they're still together and seem happy to me.

[Fletch Lives]

People often find suitable partners in school. The grass is not greener on the other side.

[understand50]

QuietRiot,

For one who is  trying to understand early/young marriages, I do not understand your take.  Not everyone is the same.  Not everyone needs to be with all sorts of people, and then settle down.  I married at 18, and have been with her for the last 50 years. Yes, about 1/2 of all early marriages end in divorce, but half don't.  Think about it, I have had sex every week of my adult life, and will live to see my Great grandchildren.   We grew up together, so there is not much in our back story we do not know about.  I have never been dumped.   Yes, we have had our issues, but not more or less than any other couple.   I am not saying everyone should get married early, but I do not see it as the great mistake  as many do.  Some people should never get married at any age.  Some are fine getting married at any age.  Marriage is a state of mind, you have it or you don't and it does not matter what your "age" is.

I wish you luck...

 

[Ruby Slippers]

The strongest couples I know met when they were very young, 18-25 range, and are still together decades later.

[Weezy1973]

On 12/11/2020 at 2:30 AM, QuietRiot said:

 I was like "Wow, you know, couples that marry THAT young, typically those marriages don't last, statistically" I knew this for a long time, but I couldn't help but wonder why the urgency to marry your high school sweet heart, and not just experience independence as an adult?

For sure, people that marry before they’re 25 have a 75% divorce rate vs 50% for the general population. And if you get married for the first time after you’re 30, you have the highest probability of staying together. 
 

That being said, it’s generational as the average age people get married keeps going up. My mom was 21 when she married my dad. And they met in high school. It was way more common back then to marry someone from high school as to expectation was that you’d marry in your 20s. 
 

I think there’s also a cultural element. People in small towns are more likely I suspect to marry a high school sweetheart, whereas people born in the suburbs or city will more likely wait a bit longer. 

[Starswillshine]

There are always plenty of fish in the sea regardless of what age you are. I think the largest issue for people marrying right out of high school is they haven't grown up enough just yet. But sometimes there is benefit in growing together. Sometimes it causes divide. I know many couples who are still together 2+ decades after HS. 

[QuietRiot]

4 minutes ago, Starswillshine said:

There are always plenty of fish in the sea regardless of what age you are. I think the largest issue for people marrying right out of high school is they haven't grown up enough just yet. But sometimes there is benefit in growing together. Sometimes it causes divide. I know many couples who are still together 2+ decades after HS. 

There's a friend of a friend I know that mentioned why she'll never marry again. Apparently, I think it was kind of an obligated marriage due to the fact she got pregnant in high school. In other words, I'm guessing it was a shotgun wedding. They were married for around 10 years, but the divide there was the fact from her teens into their 30s...as they aged together, same ages...that they've developed different believes and attitudes as they grew older...by 30-ish, they'd become completely incompatible, and thus divorced.

That said, her notion of romance was never that of permanence. That nothing lasts forever....as she is a realist.

[5x5]

On 12/11/2020 at 9:30 PM, QuietRiot said:

but I couldn't help but wonder why the urgency to marry your high school sweet heart

I married her because I got her pregnant.

[5x5]

To expand further. When I got married the first time, following her getting pregame, she was 18 and I was 19 and we had been together since we were 17 and 16 respectively. Now that marriage didn't last long as a consequence of infidelity on her behalf, yet not all things last.

On the other hand I started dating my 2nd wife, when I was 24 and she was 25. With us getting engaged, when I was 26 and she was 27. Followed by getting married when I was 27 and she was 28 (with no pregnancies until after we were married). While today so far at 49 and 50 respectively, we're still happily together.

For some people getting married young works out splendidly and for some it doesn't, life is a lottery good luck on the ride. That said I don't think it's a case of people don't know that their aren't other fish in the sea. Some of us know that very well and had that experience, yet still married young. Likewise for some of us, our sexual relationship feelings are extremely intense and that is a factor as well.

That said my wife and I know plenty of friends that married their High-School sweethearts, and are still together in their 50s and older.

[Lance Mannion]

On 12/11/2020 at 2:30 AM, QuietRiot said:

 At the time, I couldn't help but to think how can anyone think that the only person they ever were involved in high school, or anyone in general, with would be "the one" for them? I mean, why not explore your options when you head off to college? Didn't it occur to them that there other fish in the sea?  I was just curious.

You know what, humans are a rationalizing species, so why should you be any different than most people. Your life and your choices were different from the people you were thinking about and you wanted to validate your own path. Surely you must have known that your questions were not some profound insight unique to you and those who married young were oblivious to these questions. Everyone knows the questions and they arrived at different answers than you.

High school is a pretty damn efficient socio-economic sorting mechanism. Where people live, parents and children, is highly dependent on income, that usually also sweeps in class and education levels of the parents. These socio-economic factors are great predictors of relationship longevity and health. Add in religion and culture and you're doing even better. This is miles ahead, in terms of predicting compatibility, than internet dating, meeting in bars, swooning over an infatuation with someone you met in passing, etc.

Now add in common history from the friendship group and common experiences from going to the same school. Now add in shared history of growing up together and thus you actually KNOW more about your spouse than someone, like you maybe, who will meet his spouse when he's 33 and she's 33, all of those formative years are only a story she tells you, all of her important romantic and sexual memories are with someone else. You will always have OTHER MEN in your marriage, her past other men, they helped shape her into who she became when she met you. That high school wife though, instead of other men shaping her into who she became, it was her high school boyfriend and later husband who had that influence, and she with him. It is often observed that we are the sum of the influence of the 5 most important people in our lives growing up, well, if you're not in the life of your spouse when they are growing up, then you're not influencing them, and that's too bad for you.

Exploring options. I hope you're not one of those people who believe in a one-sided coin. Every path you take in life means you've closed off a different path. You got to explore options but by doing so you closed off a path where you built a life with someone during your formative 20s. What you gained in variety you lost in depth of relationship. Neither past is inherently better, they produce different outcomes. For women,  research shows that the fewer sexual partners they have in life, the happier their marriages, the lower their incidence of depression and of divorce, with virgins having the healthiest life outcomes. That's got to be worth something, for both the woman and her husband.  All else being equal between two women, wouldn't you rather be with one who is happier, less prone to depression and with less risk of divorce? I certainly would because that improves the quality of my life.

Quote

I remember one time, I was talking to a friend of mine, and we mentioned a couple that were seniors in high school. Knew them through geek circles. Found out they were marrying as soon as they both graduated high school. I was like "Wow, you know, couples that marry THAT young, typically those marriages don't last, statistically" I knew this for a long time, but I couldn't help but wonder why the urgency to marry your high school sweet heart, and not just experience independence as an adult?

Kids also know that Santa Claus exists and will visit their house early Christmas morning.  Sadly, what those kids know is not really true. Same thing with what you know. What you know is really junk social science. If I asked you what was the leading cause of divorce, you'd probably answer with "Arguments about money" and you'd be correct. Now, what is the leading cause of divorce among couples who marry when young? Money problems.  Here's where the junk social science comes in, that answer is ignored though and misrepresented as youth being the cause of divorce. Young people, married or single, tend to be poorer than older people. Not a surprise.

What a proper study would do is to control for all of the factors which lead to divorce and then isolate, and study alone, the influence that youth has on divorce. Most of what you know is not informed by good social science. Now, that doesn't completely invalidate what you know because there likely is some truth in there, but the causation of YOUTH leading to DIVORCE is much smaller than imagined. Secondly, there is the issue of marital longevity. Getting married at 19 and getting divorced at 49, is still lumped in the same grouping as getting married at 19 and getting divorced at 21. That decision to divorce at 49 is likely, somewhat, influenced by knowing that you have a good shot at a 2nd marriage. What though is the calculation for someone who married at 35 and had the same 30 year marriage, what are their prospects for a 2nd marriage at 65? If not so great, then that likely diminishes the appeal of divorce at 65 because they don't want to enter old-age all alone.

There are a lot of balls in the air that need to be juggled when you want an answer to "How important is young age at marriage to the likelihood of divorce?" The best answer I can give you after looking at this question in-depth, is "No one really has an answer to that question."

On 12/11/2020 at 6:33 AM, QuietRiot said:

Yeah, it is kind of amazing that they are still together after all these years....usually young couples start getting the itch when they hit around 30 lol As typically their minds haven't yet matured fully.

I absolutely love it when I see this "their brains haven't fully developed yet" issue brought up.  You know what, we shouldn't prosecute people under the age of 26 for any crimes, let them murder and rape and steal and vandalize to their heart's content because their brains are not yet fully formed.  I suspect that you're seeing the flaw in this talking point.

Whether brains are fully formed at age of marriage is only important if the brain development yet to come is important to the decision to marry, the conduct within marriage and the ability to weigh choices intelligently. So, like the crimes or murder, rape, theft and vandalism, the brains of youth and young adults are formed ENOUGH to understand what constitutes proper and legal behavior, and by the time one enters one's mid-teens, there is enough maturity in brain development to understand HOW relationships work, by the time of one's late-teens, what lifelong commitment means and how to coexist with a spouse is also understood, thereafter further brain development isn't the make or break issue influencing marital health. How do we test this? We subject the hypothesis to a falsification test. Are there couples who married young, WITH UNDEVELOPED BRAINS, who are in long and successful marriages? You bet there are. This wouldn't be the case if brain development needed to be fully complete in order to make good decisions in regards to dating, relationships, marriage and keeping a marriage alive and healthy.

On 12/11/2020 at 7:04 AM, understand50 said:

QuietRiot,

For one who is  trying to understand early/young marriages, I do not understand your take.  Not everyone is the same.  Not everyone needs to be with all sorts of people, and then settle down.  I married at 18, and have been with her for the last 50 years. Yes, about 1/2 of all early marriages end in divorce, but half don't.  Think about it, I have had sex every week of my adult life, and will live to see my Great grandchildren.   We grew up together, so there is not much in our back story we do not know about.  I have never been dumped.   Yes, we have had our issues, but not more or less than any other couple.   I am not saying everyone should get married early, but I do not see it as the great mistake  as many do.  Some people should never get married at any age.  Some are fine getting married at any age.  Marriage is a state of mind, you have it or you don't and it does not matter what your "age" is.

I wish you luck...

 

Agree. There are opportunity costs to our choices in life. By marrying early you got a lot of benefits, some of which you mentioned, and you had to pay a cost of foregoing some experiences that come to those who marry later in life, and this is what you are always bludgeoned with by those late-marrying people, but they seem to have a blindspot about what they gave up in order to get what they got.

I too committed to my wife when I was young and she was even younger. All of her sexual experiences are with me, so all of her memories are with me. There are no "ones who got away" plaguing my existence, she is not some Alpha Widow, I'm not the guy she settled for, she hasn't ridden the carousel, our history together is long and extensive, we've been together as we've changed through life, our sex lives were full, frequent and fantastic during a period when our friends, well the dudes at least, were having trouble scoring regular sex partners, the exuberance of our youth was not given to others but to each other, something as silly as going to a concert and putting my women up on my shoulders, seems this is something is more appropriate to do when you're in your early 20s compared to going to a concert with your date when you're 37 (not that dignified at that age.)

We don't have trust issues (arising from past negative romantic experiences), and no heartbreak, no lost loves, no baggage, no STDs, no kids from past relationships, no abortion trauma linking us to another partner, no awkward moments of running into, or associating, with past lovers. You know what this means, the pleasure we get from maintaining an innocence and purity in our relationship is higher than that experienced by people who meet later in life. Choices come with consequences, there is no "One Best Path." There is, to us at least, actual value from having a feeling of high trust, an innocence to our love and a depth of purity, these bring real-life satisfaction. Life has a way of robbing us of those feelings, yet we've still managed to keep them alive. That's worth something and it's also worth making a sacrifice to get that.

On 12/14/2020 at 11:25 AM, Weezy1973 said:

For sure, people that marry before they’re 25 have a 75% divorce rate vs 50% for the general population. And if you get married for the first time after you’re 30, you have the highest probability of staying together. 
 

Higher divorce rate already discussed above. For the over-30s and their lower divorce rate there are two unique factors, socioeconomic sorting, most of those who put off marriage until their 30s are likely to be done with education and are already on track with careers, so they reduce the stress of long distance relationships, career opportunities splitting them and they, most likely, are now higher earning and have some wealth established, so now, for them, divorce becomes a more expensive proposition, especially if they wait for their children to be "old enough." Someone marrying at 18 because of pregnancy may get divorced at 37 and their child is now 18. There wasn't much opportunity to bank their wealth during those years, especially with children, so by the time divorce comes around, they're just entering their peak earning years, meaning divorce take out less of your wealth and future retirement income. Compare to couple who married at 35, have a child at 36, and divorce when the child is 18, at 54. That retirement account is pretty impressive, all of those married years were at good income level due to job experience already being established. Divorce is now a much more expensive proposition and you only have 11 years left to top up your retirement accounts to make-up for what you lost in divorce. Lots of folks simply do not pull the trigger for divorce. So the upshot here is that "maintaining the marriage comes at a higher cost" for those later in life than for those earlier in life. Yes, the marriage is still alive, so lower divorce rate, but how happy is the marriage when your "2nd chance at happiness" is taken away from you compared to those who divorce earlier in life and can try to capture that 2nd chance?

One other point,  the pool of people entering marriage at a young age is different from those who enter later in life. Young marriage draws far more heavily for working class, high impulse, less education, less income, etc. To have a proper comparison, you need to look at all of these life-factors being controlled, so comparing young and old when both are working class, high impulse, less education, etc, and when you do that, the rate of divorce for those older people will significantly increase.

Quote

That being said, it’s generational as the average age people get married keeps going up. My mom was 21 when she married my dad. And they met in high school. It was way more common back then to marry someone from high school as to expectation was that you’d marry in your 20s. 
 

I think there’s also a cultural element. People in small towns are more likely I suspect to marry a high school sweetheart, whereas people born in the suburbs or city will more likely wait a bit longer. 

Absolutely agree, there's a cultural element. Watch some 50s and 60s TV. Wally Cleaver, in "Leave it to Beaver" was shown going over to his newly married friend's apartment, the friend (played by a young Ryan O'Neil) is shown coming home from work, young teenaged wife greeting him, making dinner for him and their guests, Wally and his gal. Ward and June are talking about the prospect of Wally getting married right out of High School.  They were not outraged by it, the conversation was normal but they worried about his future and how he would support a wife.

Skip a decade later and the show "Family Affair" had an elder daughter, Cissy, and she's in high school, and jealous that some of her friends are already getting married, she's dating college boys, even a European noble who was 10+ years older than her, and she even had a crush on one of Uncle Bill's chums, some actor who was a heartthrob, then there was an episode of one of Cissy's girlfriends working the angles to date Uncle Bill and become his wife. Uncle Bill shot her down, gently and sensitively. These weren't outrageous plot elements, this was the cultural norm.

Fast forward into the 21st Century, the show "Glee" which is probably fresher in our memories than those two older sitcoms. What characterized "Glee" was how they pushed boundaries with their characters. So, we know that the writers had no problem whatsoever with pushing boundaries and making the audience face their prejudices, and now came time for the grand love story between Finn and Rachel to reach a point of culmination, will the two love birds get married upon graduating High School. No damn way, that's too offensive to present-day cultural norms.  If any show could have advanced that plot element, it was this show, they pushed lots of boundaries before, but this would be pushing the boundary in the "wrong direction" meaning to older cultural standards, not towards the new cultural standards concocted out of thin air, that is breaking new ground.

So absolutely agree, most people don't have any original thoughts in their heads, they simply swim with the cultural current they're in. There has been a concerted effort to stigmatize young marriage and it's paying off when we look at results. Propaganda is a key element of this phenomenon.

On 12/15/2020 at 3:22 AM, QuietRiot said:

There's a friend of a friend I know that mentioned why she'll never marry again. Apparently, I think it was kind of an obligated marriage due to the fact she got pregnant in high school. In other words, I'm guessing it was a shotgun wedding. They were married for around 10 years, but the divide there was the fact from her teens into their 30s...as they aged together, same ages...that they've developed different believes and attitudes as they grew older...by 30-ish, they'd become completely incompatible, and thus divorced.

That said, her notion of romance was never that of permanence. That nothing lasts forever....as she is a realist.

People never stop changing. Another key factor in divorce, in all age groups, is "grown apart."

Edited December 21, 2020 by Lance Mannion

[basil67]

@Lance Mannion what a first post!  Both epic and thoughtful.  Glad to have you on board.

 

 

[Emilie Jolie]

1 hour ago, basil67 said:

@Lance Mannion what a first post!  Both epic and thoughtful.  Glad to have you on board.

 

 

Seconded. Best post I have ever read here on LS.

[Emilie Jolie]

To the OP, that would have been my ideal scenario, but it didn't pan out as I'd hoped.

I do think there's an element of luck / timing / availability / good personality judgement skills / general outside circumstances you can't do much about involved too, in fairness, but I think HS/college/ uni sweetheart couples that manage to stand the test of time are the definition of commitment and love.

I know it's possible to find that later in life too because I've seen it often - you 'just' need to find that 'soulmate' person who has been on a similar journey to yours. You can find a true connection at anytime in your life, regardless of what social sciences or divorce rates say so it's not all doom and gloom.

Not sure whether you are dating or looking to date @QuietRiot, but your path is unique to you; regardless of your past or where you're at in life, it's still all to play for if that's what you want.

Edited December 21, 2020 by Emilie Jolie

[Lance Mannion]

2 hours ago, Emilie Jolie said:

To the OP, that would have been my ideal scenario, but it didn't pan out as I'd hoped.

I do think there's an element of luck / timing / availability / good personality judgement skills / general outside circumstances you can't do much about involved too, in fairness, but I think HS/college/ uni sweetheart couples that manage to stand the test of time are the definition of commitment and love.

You're writing about my marriage here. I wrote earlier about opportunity costs and different paths, my life, my marriage would be entirely different if any number of elements in my life had changed. I know this isn't really profound, this describes everyone's life, but it so rings true for me. I met my wife when she was a few hours old. This depended on our mothers being college best friends, this depended on our fathers being business friends, and one of the mothers introducing her boyfriend's (future husband) friend to the other mother. Then it depended on each couple getting married. Then maintaining friendship as two married couples. So, our parents did their part by existing and getting married. Now it was up to us, we had to actually like each other, then love each other. Proximity helped, parents being supportive really, really helped. If there was a different roll of the dice, I could have seen my wife as a snotty brat and wanted nothing to do with her. That didn't happen. She could have seen me as a jerk and instead could have been attracted to any number of other guys. That didn't happen. She had me in her sights from the age of 8 and I ignored her, she didn't give up. Luck, timing, availability, good personality judgement skills, general outside circumstances, and more, worked well. This train could have derailed at any point and it never did.

So, I won a big prize but to win that prize I had to close off other paths. That's life. Other guys have fantastic stories to tell, great memories of other women. I've got different stories and different memories.

What I did get was a woman who matched me intelligence, ambition, our families raised us with very similar beliefs, our parents modeled very similar marital dynamics and parenting behavior. If you believe "the apple doesn't fall far from the tree" (which I do) then what I saw with her parents made my decision so much easier, I had a pretty good window into how my wife would look and behave in marriage by being up-close and seeing her parents' marriage over the years. My wife was a "good bet" for me because a.) she was hot, b.) being the products of our parents, who all four got along well, we were predisposed to the same personality traits and we did, in fact, get along very well.

So much luck though, but also knowing when to grab good fortune by the tail and hang on for dear life.

2 hours ago, Emilie Jolie said:

I know it's possible to find that later in life too because I've seen it often - you 'just' need to find that 'soulmate' person who has been on a similar journey to yours. You can find a true connection at anytime in your life, regardless of what social sciences or divorce rates say so it's not all doom and gloom.

Not sure whether you are dating or looking to date @QuietRiot, but your path is unique to you; regardless of your past or where you're at in life, it's still all to play for if that's what you want.

The problem for later in life love is the "search problem" and the "testing out phase" because most relationships are based on initial attraction and it takes some time to work through that infatuation phase in order to determine the quality of the lasting-love phase. If it doesn't work, you're back to the searching again and if you're no longer in college (which sorted your schoolmates by intelligence and SES) then you're out in the "wild." in the city, meeting people mostly through random paths crossing and having to do a lot of weeding on intelligence, career, SES, religion, etc. Things used to be so much simpler when people meet through family, church, neighborhood, school.

[QuietRiot]

15 minutes ago, Lance Mannion said:

You're writing about my marriage here. I wrote earlier about opportunity costs and different paths, my life, my marriage would be entirely different if any number of elements in my life had changed. I know this isn't really profound, this describes everyone's life, but it so rings true for me. I met my wife when she was a few hours old. This depended on our mothers being college best friends, this depended on our fathers being business friends, and one of the mothers introducing her boyfriend's (future husband) friend to the other mother. Then it depended on each couple getting married. Then maintaining friendship as two married couples. So, our parents did their part by existing and getting married. Now it was up to us, we had to actually like each other, then love each other. Proximity helped, parents being supportive really, really helped. If there was a different roll of the dice, I could have seen my wife as a snotty brat and wanted nothing to do with her. That didn't happen. She could have seen me as a jerk and instead could have been attracted to any number of other guys. That didn't happen. She had me in her sights from the age of 8 and I ignored her, she didn't give up. Luck, timing, availability, good personality judgement skills, general outside circumstances, and more, worked well. This train could have derailed at any point and it never did.

So, I won a big prize but to win that prize I had to close off other paths. That's life. Other guys have fantastic stories to tell, great memories of other women. I've got different stories and different memories.

What I did get was a woman who matched me intelligence, ambition, our families raised us with very similar beliefs, our parents modeled very similar marital dynamics and parenting behavior. If you believe "the apple doesn't fall far from the tree" (which I do) then what I saw with her parents made my decision so much easier, I had a pretty good window into how my wife would look and behave in marriage by being up-close and seeing her parents' marriage over the years. My wife was a "good bet" for me because a.) she was hot, b.) being the products of our parents, who all four got along well, we were predisposed to the same personality traits and we did, in fact, get along very well.

So much luck though, but also knowing when to grab good fortune by the tail and hang on for dear life.

The problem for later in life love is the "search problem" and the "testing out phase" because most relationships are based on initial attraction and it takes some time to work through that infatuation phase in order to determine the quality of the lasting-love phase. If it doesn't work, you're back to the searching again and if you're no longer in college (which sorted your schoolmates by intelligence and SES) then you're out in the "wild." in the city, meeting people mostly through random paths crossing and having to do a lot of weeding on intelligence, career, SES, religion, etc. Things used to be so much simpler when people meet through family, church, neighborhood, school.

The bolded...yeah, college was probably the last ditch effort to find someone to marry. I remember when I was in college, a lot of people were planning their weddings around the same time as they were graduating with their degrees. 

Now, meeting people through church, not going to happen. Mostly married people in church, and rarely singles, even at that, people just go to church, and go home...no socializing after. Same with all "out in the wild" situations.  Most women don't like being approached at the gym or bookstore, etc. Stranger danger, etc.

[pepperbird2]

On 12/11/2020 at 6:30 AM, QuietRiot said:

When I graduated high school, I left, did the military and college thing, and came back in my mid-20s.  After that, I took a few community college courses, and it appeared that most women between 18 and 25 were engaged or married. Some already had kids. At the time, I couldn't help but to think how can anyone think that the only person they ever were involved in high school, or anyone in general, with would be "the one" for them? I mean, why not explore your options when you head off to college? Didn't it occur to them that there other fish in the sea?  I was just curious.

I remember one time, I was talking to a friend of mine, and we mentioned a couple that were seniors in high school. Knew them through geek circles. Found out they were marrying as soon as they both graduated high school. I was like "Wow, you know, couples that marry THAT young, typically those marriages don't last, statistically" I knew this for a long time, but I couldn't help but wonder why the urgency to marry your high school sweet heart, and not just experience independence as an adult?

I didn't meet my husband in high school- it was in university. Mind you, we both had some independent experience, but that's not the same as "marriage experience". That doesn't seem to be dependent on age- it's something you grow together. It happens over years of being married, (almost 24 now for us) shared joys and sorrows. There's times when, for five cents I could have throttled him, but deep down there was still that same thing that brought us together in the first place. 

Just my opinion, but there's no one size fits all. Some really benefit from "playing the field" so to speak, as it helps them to learn about what they are looking for in a long term partner. Others don't need that.

 

[Lance Mannion]

2 minutes ago, QuietRiot said:

The bolded...yeah, college was probably the last ditch effort to find someone to marry. I remember when I was in college, a lot of people were planning their weddings around the same time as they were graduating with their degrees. 

Now, meeting people through church, not going to happen. Mostly married people in church, and rarely singles, even at that, people just go to church, and go home...no socializing after. Same with all "out in the wild" situations.  Most women don't like being approached at the gym or bookstore, etc. Stranger danger, etc.

I hear you. The clock is always ticking. There's a window of opportunity, it starts in high school and stays open for college and then starts to close. So you asked about the other fish in the sea, you got to fish when the fishing is in season. If you want to experience those other women and life life large as a single guy, well, you have to do it with your eyes open, there is a cost to everything we do. I never got the carefree single life doing what I pleased when I pleased, that was my cost.

[Lance Mannion]

6 minutes ago, pepperbird2 said:

Just my opinion, but there's no one size fits all. Some really benefit from "playing the field" so to speak, as it helps them to learn about what they are looking for in a long term partner. Others don't need that.
 

My wife and I wonder about this, we don't actually see that much evidence for this from the people we know, it seems more of a backwards pointing rationalization because the people our friends pick are not changing that much from their past relationships, so whatever learning they've done is not all that obvious. Of course there are the blatant examples of people being chosen for "fun" rather than serious relationship potential and then the relationship potential partners are chosen, but this isn't because of new knowledge being developed, they all knew who was good for relationships and good for fun very early in life.

[Emilie Jolie]

 

26 minutes ago, Lance Mannion said:

Now it was up to us, we had to actually like each other, then love each other

Of course. What I meant was there was an element of all stars aligning just right for you two to 'find' each other. 

27 minutes ago, Lance Mannion said:

Things used to be so much simpler when people meet through family, church, neighborhood, school.

This. Not so great for those who are not 'from this time'. Luckily there are other ways to find happiness, fulfilment and contentment in life 🙂.

 

[QuietRiot]

10 minutes ago, Lance Mannion said:

I hear you. The clock is always ticking. There's a window of opportunity, it starts in high school and stays open for college and then starts to close. So you asked about the other fish in the sea, you got to fish when the fishing is in season. If you want to experience those other women and life life large as a single guy, well, you have to do it with your eyes open, there is a cost to everything we do. I never got the carefree single life doing what I pleased when I pleased, that was my cost.

Speaking of which....wanted to share this blog entry with you. She's actually a friend of a friend (via social media circles)

https://time.com/4202588/marriage-checklist/

Wanted to see what you gleaned from it. Some may frown upon this attitude, but she does put it in a way that makes that saying single until your end of days more appealing.

 

Edited December 21, 2020 by QuietRiot

[basil67]

On 12/11/2020 at 9:30 PM, QuietRiot said:

I couldn't help but wonder why the urgency to marry your high school sweet heart, and not just experience independence as an adult?

Did you ever have a long term, loving relationship at that age?   What stopped you from marrying her?