Flutherites, how many of you are happily married after 10 years or more?

Mrs Squeeky and I are going strong into year 26, and we had a rather small wedding only about 30people.

We’ve been married for over 13 years. We eloped.

My brother’s been married for over 32 years, and their wedding was FL.

@squeeky, was it a quicky, backyard bbq type thing, or was it something involving caterers, and renting a hall type thing?
If it was a backyard type thing, than I would consider that under the elopement style thing.
Anything requiring caterers, and renting a hall, and setting a date well in advance with more than just the immediate family members, I would consider on the formal side.

We rented a church and hall, and had the date well planned.

@SQUEEKY2 Then I would consider that formal.

FW Married 30 years.
My sister FW Married 42 years.
Other sister FW divorced after 22 or so years. 2nd marriage FW Married 17 or so years.
My brother FW divorced 8 years. Remarried FW married 12 years or so.
My parents were married 35 years when my dad passed. That was closer to EL.

Formal wedding, 14 years and counting…

First marriage, 17 years, moderate sized formal wedding.

Second marriage, 10 years, moderate sized formal wedding.

My 1st marriage was FW=7 years
Current marriage was EL=7 years this month and going strong
My mom’s 1st marriage EL=20 years
her 2nd marriage EL=8 years
maternal grandparents EL=60 years (grandma died)

My husband and I will be celebrating our 28th anniversary in a couple of weeks.

It was neither a big wedding nor an elopement. Just a small family event with about 25 guests. Formal wedding ceremony, informal reception (at home).

My parents have been married for 52 years.
My husband’s parents: 55 years and counting

Sister: 1st marriage: EP, 4 years, divorced
2nd marriage: FW, 12 years and counting
Brother: FW 5 years and counting
Cousin: FW 17 years, divorced, she has not re-married.

(My understanding of an elopement is when you get married without inviting or even telling your family).

BHIW* 19 Years Married
28 years together

She’s still the person I want to spend all my time with.

* Big Honkin’ Italian Wedding
Beautiful church on a hill. The hall was octagonal shaped overlooking a small river. An endless amount of family-style Italian food and pastries. Good music and far too much dancing. We had about 200 guests.

To be honest the last year and a half has been difficult for us, but I still consider ourselves happily married. We have been married 22 years.

We dated a year, got engaged, and married a year later.

100 people at an evening wedding, which was at a fancy-ish hotel on the beach. Semi-formal attire. Religious ceremony (reformed Jewish). The reception we had a band and three courses and people danced all night. There was a cocktail hour before the reception with appetizers.

My first marriage was in a Unitarian Church with two dozen or so in attendance. I was twenty-seven. She moved out after ten years and we divorced two years later. Twelve years passed before I married again. This time it was held in the back yard of a friend with a dozen in attendance. We will be celebrating our twenty-second anniversary this month. I am seventy-five and could not be happier.

We just celebrated our 33rd. Ours was a no-frills civil ceremony before a magistrate. The only attendees were the two required witnesses.

Parents: FW, married 10+ years, still together
Grandparents: FW, married 10+ years, still together
Other Grandparents: FW, married 10+ years, one died
Aunt/Uncle: FW, married 10+ years, still together
Aunt/Uncle: FW, married 10+ years, still together
Aunt/Uncle: FW, married 10+ years, still together
Cousins: FW, married 10+ years, still together

That’s all I know. I guess it’s an accurate reflection of my Catholic family haha. I haven’t been around long enough to be sure about any other ceremonies.
The ones I’ve been to have been recent, and all are still together. One just had their first baby a few weeks ago, actually.

I married an axe muderer…

Here’s the story of my immediate family.

Parents: 53 yeard before Dad passed, they eloped;

Older Bro: 38 yrs., before he passed;
Older Sis: 56 yrs. & counting. Both had large traditional church wedding and reception all paid for by bride’s family.

My wife and I had a small church wedding, with about 20 or so friends, paid for ourselves, going on 27 (mostly) happy years.

My younger bro: similar to mine, going on about 20 years.

Next younger sis: traditional wedding and reception as older sibs; lasted less than a year, he became abusive.

Next younger sis: similar to mine, going on 29 or 30.

Youngest sis: similar to mine, divorced after 20 years. He was subsequently diagnosed with PTSD (Vietnam vet). Sadly, he passed a couple years ago.

25 years in August. A second marriage for both of us, I was widowed and he was divorced. We had a medium sized wedding I would say. less than 100 guests.
My daughter is at I think 12 or 13 years and she had a huge wedding. My other daughter is just at 10 and they went to Vegas and brought 50 or so of their closest friends and family along.

41 years; very small “formal wedding” put together in a week on a shoestring budget

Wow! Impressive so far. So marriage isn’t a dead horse like the media would like people to believe.

@Pandora The statistic is around 70% of first marriages stay together. I don’t remember the exact number. I wouldn’t say all of those marriages are necessarily happy, but the stat commonly used is 50% of all marriages end in divorce, and that doesn’t really paint an accurate picture. Like all statistics, they need to be questioned, broken down, and analyzed.

My Bear and I married in small ceremony at friend’s house 15+ years ago.

@JLeslie The statistic is around 70% of first marriages stay together.

I wonder if that takes into account previous marriage-like relationships? For example, our marriage was the second for my wife, but I had never technically been married, but had been in a live-in relationship for longer than she had been married.

@Pandora marriage isn’t a dead horse like the media would like people to believe.

Some observations of both my own and other long-lasting marriages:

IMHO, in order for a marriage to last, the commitment has to be there from the beginning. Both individuals must be willing to compromise on some things, work to keep it a living, loving, evolving relationship. And I believe one aspect that a you don’t hear about a lot is friendship. If my wife had not been my friend, she probably would never have become my “girlfriend”, let alone my fiancee or ultimately my wife of almost 30 years. I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve heard someone in a long-term marriage refer to their spouse as their “best friend”.

FWIW, my advice to anyone who might be looking for that “one”: Find yourself a good friend. The kind of friend that loves you for who you are and who you want to be, and that you love the same way. That can be the beginning of a strong friendship. I can’t think of a stronger foundation to build a relationship of any type, especially marriage.

I would be pretty sure the stats are based on civil/legal marriages.

I just googled and this site has 2012 stats for divorce. My stat is old, I know that number from
many years ago, so I guess it has changed. It’s more like 60% of first marriages stay together.