Marriage. A hefty step in life where you merge your life selflessly with another person. Years, moreover decades, people would marry at a young age and the divorce rates were lower. Nowadays, people are getting married later in life because they want to get their educations, have a career, etc. But, we also see people of all ages, even younger adults moving in with each other instead of getting married. Moreover, I feel nowadays people are living together, unwed. So what is the difference? The big difference in my opinion is you don't have that official document that legally binds you as husband and wife. You can also easily walk out when the relationship gets tough.
I'll admit, I'm 18, will be two and a half months from my 19th birthday when I get married and 9 and a half months into my relationship. People think I am too young and feel that my fiance and I are rushing into marriage, or other words being rash. Some others think he controls me, when he never has. I feel like no one ever takes the time to ask me why I want to marry my fiance or why I want to get married this young. First of all, I do say I am young and our relationship and even are engagement is short, but it feels so right for me and us. I feel like some people get to know each other fast and some people take a longer time to get to know each other. With being away from school for three and a half months, my fiance and I always talked with text, snapchat, and FaceTime. Our FaceTime sessions would last for many, many hours. This allowed us to talk and really get to know each other. I know he knows the real me and I know I know the real me, and he feels the same way.
Marriage should not have an age to it. You should get married when you feel it is right and feel mature enough to take that step. There is no real "right" age to get married. It is all up to you, no one else. In my opinion, I feel I am mature and I know I have my head screwed on tight. I know who I am honestly and don't go out and experiment with different things. People will say from 18 to 28, you change. Yes, you do because you mature and have more life experience. However, every 5 to 10 years you change and become more mature, due to all the experiences you go through. I never been the partying type and don't feel I need to go out and party to have "fun." People tell me to go have fun. You know you can still go out and do things when you are married. You don't become an old person automatically because you are married. You don't become an old prude. You still have dreams and goals. When you are married you should have your own dreams and have dreams together. You can always do them together.
Anyway, with that said my fiance and I went on our first date on November 6, 2013. From there I wanted to date around and was afraid of getting my heart broken. I actually had my heart broken over the summer 2013 and didn't want to go through that feeling again. Plus, BYU-I has been nicknamed "BYU-IDO," and I always thought that marriage in college was okay as long as you focused on your education and had the same goals and wants. I even thought that if it happens, it happens. I would not marry the first guy unless I honestly know he is the one. This is what actually happened to me.
Let me back track to October 30, 2013, when I had such a rough day that day where I was envious of people getting dates and all. I prayed that night and just poured out my heart and asked Heavenly Father if I could at least meet my future husband. A few days later Taylor came into my life. On November 7, 2013 we had our second date and had our first kiss together, that date freaked me out, due to that kiss. That was my first kiss ever and let's say I froze big time and went into shock. Then on November 8, 2013 I went to the temple with a friend to do baptisms for the dead, while waiting I was praying about if I should continue to date Taylor or not. I then got this prompting where I felt and knew that if I kept dating him I would eventually marry him. I was actually freaking out once I got that prompting because I did not expect that. From then on I kept getting promptings here and there. My birthday came along a few days later and that night I really, really knew I wanted to be with him, but I was afraid to take that next step. Wednesday, November 12th, he found out me having another date with someone else that Thursday. He said he would allow me to date around if I wanted, but he wouldn't be around a lot because he did not want to get hurt. I then evaluated how I felt and decided that I did not want to lose him because I really, really liked him. That was my choice, then November 14, we made it official. He wanted me to make it official and do it when I wanted it. I felt the 14th was right, plus I wanted a relationship with him at that time. I may have told people that I did not want to rush into anything, but I then really thought about what I wanted and it was that.
I honestly feel like I know him so well and feel ready to make this step in my life. I know people say young marriages are doomed to fail, but every relationship is different. I feel a lot of marriages fail because people don't take the time to work their problems out and leave when it gets too hard. You need to work it out and be equals. A marriage should have love, comfort, support, caring, trust, etc. built in a marriage. Well, there are many other qualities too. A marriage is work, it is not a cake walk. You aren't going to make each other happy all the time. You really don't know the future. You can marry someone at any age and could even date them for a very long time or short time and still end up in a divorce. It is a leap of faith you take and you need to be prepared for it. Some people may say well how do you know he is the one? Well, how do YOU know your spouse that you married was the one? You are taking a chance and marrying them because you think that person is the one and being able to see that person in your future/life. So pretty much you can have a plan and life is life, things change and may not go to according to plan. Life can be a guessing game and you do not know what your future holds, no matter how old you are.
I want to marry my fiance because I love him and want him in my life. I want to be able to come home to him every night and have him be the first and last thing I see each day. I want to have each other able to confide, love, and support one another. We may be poor at first, but those years will be the best years of our marriage, because that will make us grow together and learn. It will make our marriage humble. We need to put our trust in the Lord. I want to marry him in the temple where I can make sacred covenants, receive grand blessings and promises. I know this will make my marriage great, especially when we put the Lord into our marriage. I very much want that.
I know my marriage will be great. Anyone can judge if they want, but you honestly don't know how I feel or my fiance feels. The only people who actually do is me, my fiance, and the Lord.
I know there can be a chance of divorce or things not going according to plan. But, I have faith. I know my fiance and I will work things out no matter what happens. We will be equally yoked and work things together. He always tells me I come first in our relationship, but I love to think we are equals. I know Taylor is the one for me because of who he is. He has his flaws and I have my own flaws. We are not perfect, but we look over them because we absolutely and truly love that person. I truly love and care for him. I know I am not making a rash decision. I have sat down many times to think about what I am doing and so has he. I read blogs about marriage (especially young marriages), scriptures, prayer, and I have read many General Conference talks on this. We know what we want in our early years of marriage and then in the future. We see things on the same page. I'm not trying to convince anyone on marriage, I am trying to have people see my thought process and how I view marriage.
Taylor always presented me with the idea of dating around and waiting to get married. Yet, I always turned him down on dating around because I wanted him, just him. I didn't date that much, I only had a few dates in college and my first date was actually prom. I have talked to many guys before and hung out with guys to know what I wanted in my future husband. You don't have to date a lot of people to know who to marry. I was the one who wanted to get married at the end of August 2014. He initially wanted November or December 2014, but I felt August was moreover right. That was my choice. It was my choice because honestly, I've always wanted a summer wedding, I wanted to make those sacred covenants in the temple, and I really do not want to get married during the middle of the semester.
With getting married, my fiance and I will still strive towards getting our bachelors and then our masters in our desired career choices. That is our #1 priority and goal that we have. We feel that in this day and age, we need to have careers, especially if something happened to him.
I am young, but I know in the end, I am making the right choice, no one can make this choice for me or even tell me that I am making the huge mistake in my life.
