Why are most couples so unprepared for marriage?

Money issues seems to be one of the biggest reasons for divorce. Couples marry without discussing how to maintain their accounts, how to spend money, how to save money. I married a guy who thought that since we had a checkbook, we must have money. I lived with him before we married and didn’t see that part of him. People change over the years too.

People think marriage is gonna be all fun and sex-games. In reality, it is responsablity to someone else, it is money problems, and it is a loss of freedom.
And I support it fully.

There are lots of reasons. I’ve know people who have married before suffering serious issues. Their lives were great while dating, something really bad happened, and they realized they had incompatible coping mechanisms. I’ve known people who really didn’t talk about their goals and ambitions. They were shocked when they realized that their spouse really meant that they didn’t want children, or wanted to stay in Europe, or needed $100K/year to be happy. I’ve known people who lied about who they were up until the wedding, assuming that everything would just work itself out afterwards. Why do people do these things? Because they’re people, and people are flawed.

A lot of couples are just too young to get married. I know people who got married before 20 whose marriages lasted 50 and more years, and here’s to them, but a lot more don’t. People grow up a lot in the years between 20 and 30. I Looking back, if I had married the man I was engaged to at 22, it wouldn’t have worked. I have no idea what he thought about the things I thought were important. I just wanted to be loved and taken care of. I wasn’t old enough to get married. And, people change.

Here’s what I’ve seen among my friends who have had marriages that didn’t make it.

-Getting married young. The amount of personal growth and change a person goes through in their 20’s is usually incredible. It can work, but the chances are good that the person who is right for you at age 22 is not the same person who is right for you at age 32.

-Rushing in because they’re sooo in love. Love’s great. Hooray love. Contrary to what the Beatles say, love is NOT all you need to make a marriage work. How will you really feel about that person’s annoying little habits, family, lack of career goals, penchant for weed smoking, habit of working 70 hours a week, handling of crises, etc after the initial lustful honeymoon phase?

-Thinking that getting hitched will solve problems. These are the same people who often decide that having a baby will solve their marital problems, which are often really the same problems they had before dating.

-Getting married because it’s what’s done in their culture. I have a friend from a small town who rushed into a failed marriage because at 25, she was considered old to be single.

-Not talking, talking, and talking some more about how they really envision their lives in the future. It’s one thing to say “Yeah! Let’s wait 10 years to have kids!” But when it really comes down to it, did they mean it?

-Not being single and figuring yourself out. I have friends who have pretty much never been alone and they define themselves by the person they’re with. That eventually gets old.

So, the TLDR version: Dating, living together, etc is all fine and dandy, but it’s not the actions that make a marriage.

I think many women (and some times men) walk into marriage believing in the “happily ever after”. The truth is that marriage is hard work. Crap happens now and then and both spouses need to pitch in and support one another. Some people are just not prepared to do that, so the other spouse suffers.

I got married when I was 21 and my husband and I are close to celebrating our 18th anniversary. We’ve had to deal with many issues through our marriage but we’ve always been committed to one another. Sadly, I’ve seen too many marriages that break up at the first sign of trouble. I’ve heard, “I didn’t sign up for this”.

But the thing is that you don’t really know how your significant other is going to react to problems unless you’ve been through a bunch before you get married.

Because marriage, like parenting, is suppose to be one of those things which we “just instinctively know” how to do. As it turns out, we don’t know how to do either one very well, and some people are downright destructive in their approach. Like the old German proverb says, “Ve grow too soon oldt, und too late schmardt!”

Wow way to many reasons. But the short of it is selfishness and different goals. Too many people enter marriage with the idea of me, me and me. Instead of we. If they would just hold onto that idea together, than they could work through conflicts. Not so it only benefits them but benefits the marriage as a whole.
Can you walk with one leg going one way and the other going the other way? No. By both taking their turn in going the same direction, you won’t loose your balance. Get enough practice in doing what is best for your marriage and it will be like being on a skate board. Little help required and you both can ride easily towards your goals.
But going in seperate direction will only pull a marriage apart till you both split.

Maturity is the bottom line in most young marriages. On the front end, before marriage, every one seems to be living in a maze. After the couple says “I do”, then reality begins to settle in some say, ” what have we done”?

Mature couples should sit and plan their future together as one person. Wife and I did this. It was us two, together, against the rest of the world. That nothing would ever come between us.

Money was a big factor, in the beginning. We talked it over and decided that I would be the bread winner and she would raise our children and work after they reach a certain age. This plan worked wonderfully for us. I worked two extra jobs and that kept us in the money we needed. She was there to make sure our kids were home after school and at the dinner table for 5 o’clock family get together. This kept our family in touch with each other.

Maturity is the name of the game and working out personal problems with each other and not involving family members is a sure sign of maturity, in which many young couples do not have today.

@john65pennington

John, you’re a noble man. : )

There is no training for relationships in our society.

@quiddidyquestions pretty much nailed it for me.

Marriage is, IMHO:
• hard work
• friendship
• a business arrangement
• love
• romance/sex

In that order. It’s not romantic, but it’s practical. I’ve explained this to a few young couples I know. It didn’t go over well.

Can be all sorts of reasons:

- Because their own parents were a bad example

- because their parents never showed disagreement in front of the children and how to resolve disagreements

- because both or one of the people in the couple think something magically changes after the marriage. This can be anything from gender roles, to some sort of fantasy of marriage solving any problems that exist.

- lack of communication about goals before and during the marriage. No one wants to feel like they cannot acheive what they want in their life because they married. Marriage should add positives not negatives. Big things like money goals, having children, career goals, where you want to live, lifestyle, pursuit of interests and hobbies, all must be discussed, considered, and worked into the relationship. A lot of young people kind of assume everyone is on the same page, when it isn’t true. My husband asked me in the first few months we were dating if I was willing to move for his career goals, he knew it was a deal breaker if I said no. We discussed never having credit card debt, abortion if a pregnancy had difficulty, expectations of paying for our children’s college, division of labor (no one should have to work more hours than the other totally work outside the home and chores inside. When I worked full time we split chores, sometimes hired a cleaning service, when I worked part time I took over the majority of household chores).

The couple should talk realistically with each other about how they expect daily life to be, and long term expecations also. I think a lot of people assume their marriage will kind of function like their parents marriage, but the person you are marrying has different parents, so the model is different.

I wish there life lessons, at school for example. It would have saved me a lot of heartache. Lessons on how having a baby changes your life forever, how to solve conflicts as you say and so on. I have no idea why we are not taught this in “Life Lessons” period in class. I think society relies on family support and parental guidance. Which is a bit idealistic for most. I’d like to think people get married because they are in love though and have the commitment to see it through till the end. Often if people do spend so much time getting to know one another, and living together, the marriage idea falls away, so perhaps marriage as an idea is outdated. Which is sad I think.

Lack of forethought. They don’t stop and truly consider the implications of living with that one person for the rest of their lives. Shortly after marriage, they discover that they have nothing in common in terms of their career goals, lifestyles, interests, or money management styles.

Tack on Lonelydragons answer to mine. I agree.

For the same reason that first time parents aren’t really prepared to be a parent. They think they know what they’re in for…but then they find out differently.

A few keys are:
Getting to know each other on an emotional level.
Being respectful and not acting selfish.
Learning how to work through a disagreement.

They have had poor role models. Edit the part about Baby Boomers

- False expectations based on folklore and the media.

- A sense of entitlement.

- Inability to exercise good sense and judgment.

- Quitter mentality.

Nobody is born with experience. Parents and society aren’t requiring kids to learn important things.

Statistically, marriages which last have several things in common:
1. The partners are alike in terms of background, but sufficiently different to keep things interesting.
2. The partners support each other’s goals.
3. Effective communication.
4. Expectations are clarified, realistic, and cover virtually everything about the marriage.

None can be truly prepared for marriage though all posseses the capacity to make it succesful. For it about loosing yourself as a single person and finding yourself within the marriage.
If one is able accomplish this they find that they have lost nothing and gained everything ,
for the marriage is well able to provide for all of it own needs and wants in abundance.

@kess Well… it should be mutual, yes??

Because so many don’t understand what love and marriage truly entails.
Many younger couples under the age of 29 doubles versus those who create a career and spend time finding themselves and knowing what they want out of their life and not falsifying information to their potential life mate due to fear of being alone.

According to enrichment journal on the divorce rate in America:
The divorce rate in America for first marriage is 41%
The divorce rate in America for second marriage is 60%
The divorce rate in America for third marriage is 73%

@AuroraSolei

The only conclusion we can draw from those stats is that some people are incapable of handling marriage.

And many are incapable because they lack the will power to see clearly through their fears and despritely cling to people for a sense of comfort-until they learn their comfort is just another person they can live without.

@AuroraSolei

True. I always wonder about those people who think someone else is going to “complete” them.

I am only 24 and through the mistakes of many in my life and my own: I know marriage is not what completes you, a family does not define you, a man/woman does not complete the person that you are. All of these things should compliment the worth of you, the soul of you and the person you are truly happy with in yourself. Unless you are truly happy with yourself and content with your soul-you will never be happy and content in a relationship that has vows-“til death do us part”.... Before you know it, you would be silently wishing upon a star for death to take you two a part. Marriage should be sacred-I’m not saying anything religious, just sacred to you. You should only marry once-unless your spouse dies, but if you make that commitmetn and take those vows, you take them with all of the responsibilites, burdens, pain, guilt, love, happiness, amazment and comfort that comes with them. You can’t pick and choose what parts of love you get-you take the good with the bad and live happily with yourself through the rest.

@AuroraSolei Which goes to prove what a good friend of mine said “You have to be a lot more careful with your second marriage because you know you can survive the breakup”. His second is going into its’ 20th year.

When we were engaged, we went to see the priest (a family friend for many years) to have these couples sessions. It was, in my opinion, bullshit and I told him so. I felt like these sessions were for 18 year olds that were infatuated with each other and that we were 22 and had been together for 4 years. There was not a single thing that he brought up that we had not already discussed yet I had to drive 90 miles each way every weekend to attend his sessions. He was not happy and told my Mother-in-law that he had serious reservations about marrying us because he felt we would not last six months. My wife and I are going on our 35th year this year and looking back over it I would say that we are still together, not because either of us is perfect (she still irritates me and lord knows I piss her off royally), but because we talk through our problems and have the ability to forgive each other for being human. We know that, despite the difficulties that being a couple brings, we are happier together than we would be apart and so we live life together and do things as a couple, not two individuals sharing a bed and kitchen.

@rojo And that’s what many young couples and other’s who divorce quickly after marriage don’t consider—the need for communication and patience and tolerance in a relationship. You don’t have to like everything about your spouse, or love every detail, you just have to know how to discuss what pisses you off in a calm fashion and work together to resolve whatever issue it is.

They expect the fairy tale without the hard work.

age has nothing to do with it

@jonsblond but they do not stop to think that many fairytales have a wicked witch or a hungry wolf.

exactly. that’s kind of my point =)

@CaptainHarley the responsibility is only to the individual to understand and do his portion, what soever the outcome from there he is rest assured that all will be well.

If he finds himself in a position in which he must dictate or demand, then he runs the risk of himself being the problem and not the solution.

Because most of them don’t think with the BIG head.

How can they be? The generation before them did little to help them along, if anything gave them bogus information. Mimicking a marriage as much as you can before a marriage is not guarantee, in fact I say more of a detriment. It doesn’t foster any real deep loyalty because you know you can trade it in like a rental car if it starts not to fit. You don’t have to make a commitment to it or the effort to keep it together as if it were your only car, vehicle, house, etc. People get caught unprepared because they can’t handle that ”they own it”. When you can’t just shuck it off, those little things you ignored when it was your weekend to be at his house or his weekend to be at yours for a hay romp now becomes important. Even if you set up a quasi-marriage with everything but the ring and paper, you still have the option to jettison it if it becomes too weighty.