Believe It Or Not, Most Women Eventually Marry

Evan Marc Katz

If you believe marriage is in decline, think again. A new government report has found that 8 in 10 women will get married by the time they turn 40, a figure that is virtually unchanged from the 1990s.

82 percent of high school graduates will marry by the age of 40 and 89 percent of college graduates will as well.

“The idea that marriage is on the decline and fading away, that picture is misleading,” said Andrew Cherlin, a demographer at Johns Hopkins University.

“Lifetime marriage is far lower today than it was during the peak years in the 1950s, when more than nine-tenths of the adult population married at some point in their lives. But the new report suggests that the decline may have stopped in recent decades,” Mr. Cherlin said, as lifetime marriage rates have changed little since the 1990s.

The real changes in society aren’t that marriage is somehow obsolete, but rather that:

a) Divorce rates are still high because people marry too quickly based on attraction rather than values.
b) Women are having kids at epic rates outside marriage – 50% of women between 20-30 give birth out of wedlock
c) People get married much later than they used to.

But, no matter how you slice it, most women do eventually marry. According to the report, 82 percent of high school graduates will marry by the age of 40 and 89 percent of college graduates will as well.

So for all the noise created by the fiercely independent “I never want to get married” types who criticize my advice for assuming that most people are looking for marriage, guess what?

Most people are looking for marriage.

If you’re not, you’re the exception, not the rule.

Read the full New York Times article here and share your comments below.

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148 Comments »Filed Under Marriage

148 Responses to “Believe It Or Not, Most Women Eventually Marry”

1. Helen 1

   Evan, this quote is factually incorrect: “50% of women between 20-30 give birth out of wedlock.”

   Instead, what the study showed was that, of the births that occur to women under age 30, over half of them are out of wedlock. These are mostly among women who did not complete college education. Not that half of women in that age range are giving birth to out-of-wedlock babies.

   I have to say, I found Sarah Tavernise’s article to propagate some rather irritating biases.  For example, in the very first paragraph, she discusses how “the drop in middle-income jobs reduced the supply of marriageable men” – implying that a man who doesn’t have a middle-income job isn’t marriageable.  Later, she refers to the 4-in-10 women currently married statistic as being “stark.” It’s only stark if one perceives a single woman’s life as being stark, which I think many on this board would disagree with.

   But thank you for posting this, because the Tavernise article links to the original CDC article, which is well-done, unbiased, and interesting. 

2. Evan Marc Katz 2

   You’re right, Helen. I wrote that too hastily. Half of the babies are born out of wedlock, not half of the mothers. I don’t think that would make an appreciable difference in the overall point, but I did unintentionally get that one wrong.

3. CK 3

   I always enjoy these Saturday posts–I like reading and digesting the underlying articles. 

   As a trained journalist, I always pause that articles like these (that go against the conventional wisdom and hype) don’t get talked about much.   

4. Andrew 4

   For example, in the very first paragraph, she discusses how “the drop in middle-income jobs reduced the supply of marriageable men” – implying that a man who doesn’t have a middle-income job isn’t marriageable.
   It’s not that his unmarriageable, it’s that his prospects for marriage (or long-term relationship) are very much reduced. This is because of hypergamy. Such a great word that is and really does much to explain how a woman’s attraction works.

5. susan 5

   considering how many people these days are in committed relationships that aren’t actually ”marriage” it is not surprising about these statistics. They are only of a kind of schock value if looked at through the lens of the 1950′s.  
   And I am glad to hear 80% of women marry – and presumably so do 80 per cent of men.  For much the same reason – even though many choose not to, and still have children, for most people, marriage (ie a formal ceremony, legal agreement, whatever) is the choice.

   What saddens me is how many get divorced. More than once.

6. Sabrina 6

   Susan (5), while it saddens me too that so many people get divorced multiple times, I do want to point out that more than ever, society is encouraging people to leave marriages that are not fulfilling.  In the past, a bad marriage was one of those life experiences you just had to bear.  It’s liberating to remind myself that there’s nothing wrong with pursuing happiness – even if I have to get married later in life. 
    

7. Evan Marc Katz 7

   The problem isn’t that people leave marriages too easily. Better to be single than in a miserable marriage. The problem is that people marry for the wrong reasons and often don’t choose partners that will make sense in 40 years. This is often the result of marrying in the midst of your first 18 months of passionate love, instead of waiting to see what your life looks like when the haze wears off.

   The goal shouldn’t be to lower the divorce rate, per se; it should be to lower the marriage rate and hope that those who get married (after 2 or 3 years) are more likely to stay together than those who get married too young and then have to “bear it” like Sabrina said above.

8. Fusee 8

   @ Evan #7
   I definitely agree: the problem is not that there are too many divorces but that there are too many marriages. And also too many on-going relationships that are going nowhere. Also, we’re talking about different kinds of marriages when we compare today’s data with 1950s’ data. Compared to the 1950s, we do not need marriage anymore for social approval, access to sex and protection, and there is no more social pressure to remain married even if unhappy. However people have not yet learned how to create the new marriage, the one not based on social status and sex, but on friendship and compatibility of values in the long-term. A marriage that we do not keep despite being unhappy, but a marriage we do not leave because we made a decision for wrong reasons.
   Human beings need a bit more enlightment, that’s all : )
   Where I disagree is with the implied idea that 2 or 3 years of dating is such a major part of the solution. To me, what really matters is what you do with your dating time.
   Taking that long is a good idea for 20-something people who are not experienced enough in the reality of life, or the ones who are really subject to “chemistry highs”, “haze”, or any other “drug-like” feelings during courtship. It’s not the case of everyone. I was once subject to this craziness, and I’m no longer a victim of it. I know how to avoid it by avoiding certain types of men, avoiding physical interactions early on, and keeping the process primarily mind-based instead of emotion-based.
   It can also be good to take more time when people meet their partner before having finished figuring themselves out, before they have carefully studied what a marriage is and is not, and when they really feel the need for more time to thoroughly investigate character, compatibility, and life goals. But that implies being aware of all of what is needed to be done during courtship. And pretty much nobody is that mindful at this stage of humanity development. If they were, there will be less marriages and less divorces! No amount of time will help if you do not even know what you need to do with your time.
   What is needed more than timeline rules is using whatever amount of time you’re giving yourself to seriously investigate the potential of a specific relationship by focusing on getting to know your partner in depth and evaluate compatibility in the long-term. It is crucial to avoid falling into a dating routine when you do the relationship instead of evaluating and investigating it. It’s what happens when people move in and start doing something looking like a marriage without having the certainty of their compatibility and the commitment that are so needed to sustain such relationship. 
   If you need 2-3 years, fine. You sure allow the “haze” to dissipate if you were in a haze. But you take a big risk of falling into a routine that is comfortable but yet does not say anything about long-term compatibility. If you are above 30 you also take the risk of wasting precious years of your life. The 30s are the most precious years, especially for a woman. I see lot of people dating multiple years, living together, etc, and yet not progressing in collecting data points and making decisions based on these data points. I also see women being strung along by men who say that they will “eventually” want to be married. Yeah, right!
   That’s why, Evan, although I agree pretty much with all of your advice about early dating, I disagree on your longer-term time rules. Or maybe I would agree if you would expand on them. At 33 I do not have time/energy for another 3 three-year relationships. I personally stick to 12-18 months as a timeline for the courtship phase because I prefer not to waste two more years for no reason (I know what to look for, I’m not in any haze, and I’m givng the guy all the facts early on, the amazing girlfriend experience as well as the challenges of my character). I’m at the 12 months mark now in the investigation of my boyfriend and our potential, and I still have – ever since the first very date – two feel strongly grounded in the reality of dating, life, and who he is. No need for two more years. In a few weeks, we’ll make a decision. I’m ready to walk away if we can not agree.

9. Paragon 9

   @ Susan

   ” And I am glad to hear 80% of women marry – and presumably so do 80 per cent of men. ”

   I wouldn’t be so hasty.

   http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0763219.html

   But, since marriage is merely an exponent of long term mating, and long term mating is (presumably) in equilibrium over evolutionary time, it is likely to stick around for as long as it values human societies.

10. Clare 10

    Evan @ #7

    I agree with you. Speaking as someone who married at age 22, and got divorced a little over 5 years later, I advise anyone who asks me to wait until at least their late 20s to get married.

    It’s not that marriages of those who marry young cannot work out, or that young adults choose bad partners. My ex-husband was a wonderful man, loving, romantic, supportive. It’s that you just simply don’t know yourself at 22. I can categorically say that I was more in love with the idea of what I thought marriage would be, and it’s a feeling that I have seen to be widespread among young women. They want the security and status that marriage provides (and who can really blame them for that?) without the long-term vision of what being married to that person day in and day out for the next 40 years would be like.

    I think the idea that you should hold off till you are slightly older before you get married holds especially for educated, intelligent, complex individuals. You have a better sense of self, of what your needs, desires and goals are at age 30, than at 22, and you are less susceptible to the opinions of others, and of society.

    I don’t think it’s for us to condemn, in any way, those who get divorced. I think it’s for us as a society to encourage people to think very long and hard before getting married in the first place.

11. Mia 11

    Hmm, really? I’m still doubtful that any woman of the under-35 cohort can any longer assume and count on getting married, no matter how great a catch she is, no matter how hard she tries, no matter how many dates she goes on, no matter how reasonable she is with requirements. I just don’t see a lot of people feeling the need for a relationship, or they are searching for something that they will never find and are the type that can never be happy with another person. Or, they pass up a lot of really good people for “the one,” only to have to break up later.

    I rolled my eyes at the couple in the movie Bridesmaids who at the beginning were having sex nonstop, even in the bathroom at restaurants, and some years down the line it shows them growing to resent each other and divorcing.  How many good people did each of them pass up? I felt no sympathy for those characters. Men never seem to get that it’s not about that, they’re looking for a “type,” a checklist, chemistry, and trying to find someone who doesn’t think that way is like playing the lottery. Even Evan, as good a game as he talks about his wife being the best woman for him, rejected dozens of great women before meeting her, for all the wrong reasons. His wife simply won the lottery by coming along when he was 35 or so (the age when even serial daters start to get tired) and had she come along when he was 31, she would have gotten the brush-off, too.

12. Fiona 12

    Hey Mia – you can’t know that about Evan and his wife. While timing is important, some people just really do seem to be really well matched.

    I agree however that it is hard to look at the facts objectively and see that there actually is a actually a very high likelihood of getting married when you keep getting knock back after knock back. Objectively you have as much chance as anyone else the same age. Subjectively, it is however very difficult to believe that if you keep getting knock back after knock back particularly the older you get. When that happens over and over you start to take it personally and think that you are unlovable (as I did in a tearful conversation with a friend earlier today about how every man who I have ever had a relationship with in the last 19 years has left me and I must therefore be the most unlovable person in the history of humankind). Statistics don’t help much at that stage. It may however be worth considering something like cognitive behavioural therapy in addition to changing dating approaches because otherwise these negative beliefs will become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

    I say this now because even when I was younger I always felt sympathy for women who weren’t married in their late 30s and uncomfortable watching films like Bridget Jones because I always has a deep seated fear that I was going to be one of them – which is of course exactly what has happened. You need to change your mind set now (as do I) and focus on the positive but I know that it is very hard to do.

13. LB 13

    Mia, I lurk on here sometimes and have seen a couple of your comments in this vein–I was wondering, do you live in NYC or another big city like that by any chance?  I’ve heard NYC is a really tough dating market because of the “checklist” factor you bring up–i.e., everybody thinks they can do even better than they’re doing right now, because there are so many options (especially for men) and people tend to establish careers/families late anyway.  I was just curious if you were in a competitive, slow-to-settle-down market like that, since the tenor of your comments makes it sound like you’re someplace where that might be a frustrating factor.  (In the small Midwestern city where I live, it’s the opposite–everybody paired off early and I’m feeling left behind at 25…)

14. helene 14

    @ Fusee 8

    I agree with you about the timelines. Wilst I think that if you are under 30 you may need 2-3 years to evaluate a partner (and also clarify your own goals and develop your relationship skills) I really do not thing people over 30 need to spend 2-3 years on a relationship to know if it is right or wrong for them.After a year of dating, for God’s sake, what is it you still don’t know about the other person in terms od establishing your compatibility??! And if there ARE things you still need to establish, get on and ask them about it!  

    I have a friend who is turning 40 in August. She and her boyfriend have just celebrated their “one year dating” anniversary. She seems very happy with him, but they haven’t really talked about marriage, moving in together, or made concrete plans about having children-  although they have raised the question of children, nothing has been decided. He also, the last time I asked, had not yet said “I love you”. She insists she is fine with all this as “its only been a year” but I find it all quite odd, to be honest. At 39, I simply don’t feel a woman who may yet want children should be dithering around “taking it slow” like this – if there are things she still needs to know about him in order to decide if he’s right for her, then she needs to get on and find out about these things. If, on the other hand, it is he who is dwdling along, I feel she needs to start asking him seriosuly about his intentions. To trundle along for 2-3 years under the guise of “getting to know each other” is nonsense. It is simply another ruse that men will employ to avoid stepping up and taking a decision. Men, after a year of dating you ought to know if you want to marry a woman or not. If you do, then propose. if you don’t then let her go so she can meet someopne who does. What is going to change in another year or two years? Nothing much, as far as I can see.

15. Evan Marc Katz 15

    @Helene and @Fusee – I’m not going to make this a long retort, but I will state quite strongly that not only do you not truly know someone after 1 year – especially if you’re still riding a dopamine high – but that you should not be making FORTY YEAR decisions after 1 year. If your love is true, it’ll still be standing a year later.

    And if you start to get panicky because “HE SHOULD JUST KNOW” and pressure him to marry you after 1 year, you’re going to alienate and/or lose MOST men. I wrote about this extensively in my Rori Raye post. It’s not just about YOUR needs and YOUR timeline. Your best bet is to give a marriage oriented man time to choose you on HIS terms instead of deciding arbitrarily that 1 year makes sense to you.

16. Mia 16

    LB – I’ve never lived in NYC (shudder!), but lived in major East Coast metro areas until six months ago moving to a medium sized Midwestern city.  No matter I am (east or west, online or off) I meet intelligent but not highly-educated, player, alpha men, yet still are extraordinarily picky , super into their careers and friends to the exclusion of anything else, maybe superficially open to a relationship but clearly don’t have things figured out and can’t be made happy. So unfortunately, I don’t see a world in which 90 percent of my college-educated cohort gets married. It’s really sad how many people in the dating realm have lost any sense of humanity and emotion – it’s a nation of emotionally unavailable zombies staggering around.

17. Christine 17

    Mia, I really do understand where you’re coming from because I’m in the midst of that myself.  I think that mindset is everywhere and not just in large metro areas.  I live in a more suburban area but still run into those types of men all the time.  Sometimes dating feels like repeatedly getting punched out by Mike Tyson, and trying to somehow still remain standing even after receiving all those blows.  However, I am also trying to change my mindset to a more positive place, difficult as it may be.  Getting married later in life isn’t necessarily a bad thing, when you’re more mature, established in life and know yourself better (not to put down people who marry young, because I do know people who got married at 19 who are still happily together. It’s just to say there are both positives and drawbacks to marrying either earlier or later in life–and marrying late also has some advantages, so it isn’t the end of the world when you haven’t married yet). I’m actually encouraged by this article that even though I’m an older woman at 33, perhaps it isn’t necessarily too late to get married and it can still happen even at this late stage.  Even as discouraged as I am right now, I just refuse to believe that of all the millions of guys on this planet, there isn’t ONE who I can be happy with. I’m encouraged by some of my friends (and my own sister) who found love even in their early to mid-30s, right when they were about to throw in the towel–and these statistics affirm that perhaps it isn’t too late.  Right now, I’m just trying to stay positive.  If there are no more good, relationship-oriented men out there, you would think that weddings would just stop happening after a certain point–but these stats show that marriage continues (and the New York Times and other publications keep churning out wedding announcements so women keep finding relationship-oriented men somehow. I especially get encouraged by the wedding announcements of older ladies like myself, to show how it’s still possible). 
     

18. Evan Marc Katz 18

    Well said, Christine.

    And, to Mia, regardless of whether you see a world in which 90 percent of your college-educated cohort eventually gets married, guess what? That’s EXACTLY what’s happening. Perhaps these numbers will change in twenty years, but the title of the article still reads, “Believe it or not, most women get married”. Guess you don’t believe it, even though it’s true.

19. Christine 19

    As for how long to date before getting married, I’m not entirely sure what the right answer is. I know people who only dated a few months before marriage and are still happily married years later–and others who got divorced even after dating for two years or more.  My own sister met her husband at 33 and married him two years later (then had my nephew at 37). I’ve also known lots of her friends who followed a similar trajectory of dating for two or more years before marriage, even though they were in their 30s.  I do sympathize with the posters on this board who don’t think they have enough time to take things slowly.  Sometimes I feel that way too–that if I find a possible prospect, I won’t have the same luxury to take things slowly as a young 20-something.  However, I’ve also seen people like my sister who took her time dating even in their 30s, and then go on to happy marriages and kids.  So it’s also difficult for me to say that I’d definitely have to shorten the dating time frame either.  I’m still working that out for myself.

20. amy 20

    Christine, where in the world is 33 old? that is the best age to be, in my opinion, especially if you are willing to date slightly older men 38-44.
    It’s sooo young!! Ok, I didn’t meet my man till I was 39 and got married at 41, so what do i know? I know that it’s really never too late as long as you have the right attitude. (Men love happy, fun, smart women).

21. K 21

    @ Christine, well said indeed.  I’m 34 and there are days I give up hope,  but generally I refuse to give up.  My dad always has said to me it only takes one and that gives me hope.  And unlike job huntiNg he has reminded me that in dating no one asks for a resume. I’ve been around loNg enough to see many mid to late 30s friends meet the one against all odds even in major metro cities.

    @mia I often see your posts and I don’t get it.  You sound like me and my friends just on really bad days.  Most of my friends have good days and periods and marry. I hope you do too.

22. Lynn 22

    In Belgium (Europe) recent studies have shown that 46% of kids born in 2009 were born outside of marriage. This is because most 20-30 olds do not marry anymore over here, instead of marrying they “buy a house together” and “have a kid together” (“that is more permanent than some paper saying that you are married”). We also have a legal construction called “official coresidence” that covers quite a lot of the protection that marriage also offers: inheritance, the state sees you as “one”, etc. However most of these people will marry later on, when the kids are 3 to 10 years old, or when they have been for let’s say 10 years. 

    So… this concept is against what quite a lot of dating coaches say: do not give your boyfriend everything (living together, kid) unless he marries you. You risk missing out on a good partner who is convinced that marriage ain’t the right wat anymore but who will still be there for you for the rest of his life.

23. Mia 23

    Christine, I’ve been surprised at several of your posts that make 33 sound practically over the hill. Most women I know in their early 30s still look young and could pass for being in their 20s. Plenty of early-mid 30s men would date a woman of the same age if she was attractive and had a good personality. Age only seems to get more problematic 35-40, because of the biological clock issue, and a lot of women that age really do start to look old and tired unless they’ve taken really good care of themselves. But I think this idea that 30s men exclusively want twentysomething women is a bit exaggerated – probably more true online, but not necessarily in real life. I know a powerful and successful woman at work who was divorced in her 20s, chose not to remarry, but kept herself in shape, attractive, wore stilettos and miniskirts, maintained a very feminine aura, and she was continuing to snag alpha men into her late 40s as boyfriends. Some people pull it off, I guess.

24. AnnieC 24

    @17 Christine

    My sister found love at 38, and now has a gorgeous baby boy(He’s soooo cute…). She is 40, almost 41.

    I found love at 37, and am about to move to my sweeties country and we will be trying for a baby too.

    Both my sister and I didn’t just want to find love, we wanted to find a man we wanted to create a family with. I think this was something we both “finally realized” when it comes to dating, and something that men tend to think more deeply about than women. Not sure why, but when looking for a LTR pay attention to wether or not you want to create a family with the man, rather than just have sex.(even if the “family” is just the 2 of you and friends, rather than a child).

    Anyway, yes it’s entirely possible, you are only 33. You are really just out of the 20′s, and we know we are often crazy during those times. 

    Definately search, but also keep enjoying your own life, and picking up new hobbies. When you get married, things may change, but you are still the same person as before, just now married.

    So remember those 2 things while dating.

    1. Do I want a family with this man?
    2. Am I expecting “me” to change, or will I just still be me, only married? And am I happy with that?

     
    Cheers
    Annie

25. Zaq 25

    Everyone gets married sometime
    Really ?

    It is not easy to draw conclusions from the data.
    Are young people delaying marriage or abandoning it ?
    The marriage rate continues to decline, the number of never married continues to increase. The number of women having babies over 40 has doubled.

    At this rate “most” will have married by age 70 (but not for more than a year)!

    Women are the cause of this phenomenon, because they are the ones that make the mating choices.
    There are less and less men on higher incomes, and women are delaying mate choice rather than “marry down”.

    The top men have too much choice, so are under no pressure to commit.
    Commitment minded men are being ignored.
    As Mia points out, women’s looks continue to diminish, so playing the waiting game can only be described as insane.

26. Fusee 26

    @ Lynn #22
     
    Interesting comment! I’m originally from Belgium, although the only real Belgian features left in me after so many years in awesome California are my picky tastes in chocolate, a rather strong French accent, and a more other-based mindset than the dramatically individualistic mindest so prevalent in the USA : )
    Although Belgium is a Western country, the view on relationships is still quite different than in the US. Marriage obsession is less necessary there given the fact that 1. People are much more relationship-oriented form a much younger age (men included), 2. LTRs are recognized by official structures so there is less need to be married for specific benefits, 3. Men in LTRs are more likely to “feel married” in terms of life commitment to their partner (as you wrote, mortgage and kids are the real commitment landmarks).
    I learned the hard way that in the USA, men tend to consider women for one of three options:
    1. the woman they f***
    2. the woman they LTR with for a little while (cohabitation, vacation, family visits,…)
    3. the woman they marry (make a team for life, buy a house, have children,…)
    Obviously I’m simplifying a little and I do not mean to generalize for all men. But in the USA it is really important for a woman interested in the “real deal” to make it very clear from the beginning that she is not going to be “just” a date. Hoping to upgrade from date to girlfriend to wife is a real challenge here, as you can notice from the comments written by confused and frustrated women.
    Therefore I learned to present myself as a future wife early on, and even if I will of course start as a girlfriend, I make sure this is considered as a temporary situation acceptable until progress towards marriage is made (or not). In the USA, a girlfriend is nothing in terms of rights, and men do not see a girlfriend as seriously as in Belgium. And they like it this way.
    That’s why American dating coaches advice their female clients to be careful not to be a girlfriend while giving wife benefits. Belgian dating coaches would give a very different advice.
    Integrating into a new culture is about finding a compromise between doing as the locals do while keeping what is best from the culture of origin. I’m bringing much more respect, of self and of others while adapting to a very market-based dating system.
     

27. Kate 27

    I find these responses funny, especially Evan who says you may not know someone is the one and be in love with someone after a year.  If you try to push a man he will run away.  I am 38 and think true intimacy and love takes time but in my last relationship he wanted to be in love after 4 months and left me because he wasn’t! Mind you he had recently ended (he was only 2 months out) things with his ex who he has a baby with because she cheated.  I thought it was smart to take time and he wanted to jump in. Who know what the right answer is?

28. Evan Marc Katz 28

    @Fusee “American dating coaches advise their female clients to be careful not to be a girlfriend while giving wife benefits.”

    I’ve never said anything remotely close to that. You must have me confused with someone who calls her clients “sirens” or “goddesses”.

    In fact, I’ve told women that the reason that men choose to marry some women over others is because of how they FEEL around you. If you give them a great girlfriend experience in the present, they’re far more likely to want to stick around for the future.

29. SS 29

    Fusee and Helene, I totally agree with you about the progression of a relationship when one is past 30. Not saying everyone has to follow a specific timeline, but I see no problem with two mature adults knowing what they want and going for it.
     
    Met my husband at 31, him 37… got engaged a year later, got married seven months after engagement. 19-month courtship in all. Don’t see a bit of a problem with it.

30. Jon 30

    Getting married and staying married are not the same thing.

    Cherlin’s main thesis as a sociologist is that Americans marry more than people in any other country, but they also divorce more. Cherlin says that Americans value both family/marriage and self-expression/personal growth; he says that these two values compete, which is why there is so much marriage, divorce, remarriage, etc.

    But you did not represent the NYT article correctly. First, you attributed the journalist’s words to Cherlin as a direct quote, which is not accurate. Second, Cherlin does not comment anywhere at all on things like people getting married for attraction v. values. Third, if you go to the actual “government report” mentioned in the NYT article, it’s a report on first marriages, not lifeteime marriage rates, and it concludes that Americans are delying their first marriages (meaning, the median age for first marriages has risen). Which is nothing new.

    Cherlin also says that in the U.S. marriage is seen as a status symbol. “It’s like the ultimate merit badge,” he says in this article, which cites a 2010 Time/PEW Research Center study on marriage trends in the US:
     
    http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2032116-1,00.html

    The higher status accorded to married people may be why most people report wanting to get married, even though so few do so successfully. 

31. Clare 31

    @ Lynn and Fusee

    I could relate to what you said about American dating culture (although I agree withe Evan, I do *not* believe in withholding “wife” benefits – whatever that means.)

    In the context of what you say about viewing people for different roles (friends-with-benefits, date, girlfriend, wife) a lot of readers’ comments here about making your intentions for the relationship known make a lot more sense.

    I live in South Africa, and it’s more conservative here, even though I’ve grown up in a white, Western culture. Boys are raised to be marriage-minded, most have gone to schools which uphold old-fashioned values. Although it does happen, “friends with benefits” arrangements are rare, and non-exclusive dating just doesn’t happen here.

    There is also a high degree of legal protection for cohabitation here. Incidence of marriage or very well-established long-term relationships is high here.

    All this is to say, women here don’t have the same fear that they won’t get married as American women seem to do. Just to place it in a cultural context. Most are confident that they will, and South African men in general are very much looking for wives, in part because it’s so socially sanctioned. 

32. Lynn 32

    @Fusee and @clare

    Fusee, your background explains your nickname I’m from the other part of the country and my name is in fact the Dutch version of this nickname

    Anyways… to continue on the cultural differences, let’s talk about the whole “dating” culture in the US. Even though -like you say Fusee- young people do not marry as much in Belgium (but same thing for The Netherlands, France, Germany, etc.) they do have very serious long term relationships.
    That’s why it’s socially not acceptable to date the way the Americans do: very casual, lots of different dates, taking a “date” to a wedding, etc. If you date multiple people at once over here (i’m not even talking about kissing them or sleeping with them) you are easily considered as someone that cannot be trusted, a slut and definitely not relationship material just one night stand material. People are serial monogamists over here, even datewise You only take someone with you to family gatherings/weddings if you have been in an exclusive relationship for I’d say 8 months orso. Must be the catholic moral of our society  

    So when I read Evan’s advice I take with me the most important parts: let the guy lead, let him shine, just be fun, show him what an incredible woman you are to be with. And all the other “date several people at once” advice… I kinda ignore  

33. Tom 33

    @ Clare # 10
     
    “young women…want the security and status that marriage provides (and who can really blame them for that)”
     
    I find this interesting – do women in general view being married as higher status than not being married? Are unmarried people lower status?
     
    # 31
     
    “South Africa men in general are very much looking for wives”
     
    Without meaning to sound insensitive or smart does the leader of your county not have several wives? I’m not sure if that’s what women on this blog are looking for.
     
    “Although it does happen “friends with benefits arrangements are rare and non-exclusive dating just doesn’t happen here”.
     
    I know several South Africans and they acknowledged this, but they also said that a large part of it is due to the prevalence of HIV there rather than men simply being “raised to be marriage-minded and having gone to schools which uphold old-fashioned values.” Is this true?
     
    @ Lynn
     There were a few too many smiley faces in that last post J.

34. Soul 34

    @ Tom, #31:

    To the remark: “South Africa men in general are very much looking for wives”
    You replied: “Without meaning to sound insensitive or smart does the leader of your county not have several wives? I’m not sure if that’s what women on this blog are looking for.” 

    What a strange comment and illogical answer… If I talk about American males’ aspirations, would you reply to me that I do not want an american man because Bill Clinton has had a blow job when he was President?

35. Fusee 35

    @ Evan #28: My quote is definitely not a reflection of your advice, I agree! Everything I read before finding your blog was “game playing” nonsense, including the notion of “withdrawing benefits”. Thanks goodness for your sensible approach.
     
    However beyond silly game-playing which I do not condone, there is some wisdom in matching level of intimacy with level of commitment. It’s not about withdrawing benefits but more about making sure we are on the same page before taking  the next significant step. For a lot of women, cohabiting, or simply going into the second or thrid year of dating implies moving towards marriage. It is simply not true for many men. Evan, when you met your wife, you were looking for a life partner and had the project of creating a family, and each additional month/year with her was a step into that direction, even if you were still figuring out a lot of things and not quite sure yet (let me know if I got it wrong, after all I do not know you). It is sadly not the case in all relationships. Some men enjoy dating a woman for years and it does not mean they want a real life commitment, although they might make her/themselves believe that they will at some point. That’s why it is important to discuss relationship goals to stop making assumptions and going into emotional debt by giving more than you would if you knew the real potential of the relationship.
     
    I agree it’s nonsense to pressure people or be too rigid. Who enjoys being pressured? I simply advocate for more openess about one’s goals and being okay when you learn that there is no match. When the other person is on the same page, it’s not threatening to do so, and it does not mean that marriage is “expected” (how could it be when you do not know one another very well?). In my case I choose to date people who have already figured themselves out, who know they are looking for a wife, and know how important this is to look at values and compatibility beyond attraction. It shrinks the dating pool, but it increases the odds in the high-quality that is left.
     
    Your advice about giving the man the best girlfriend experience is priceless. In my 20s I was so critical and needy. I really had to develop my character and become more accepting, more patient, and more fun. Now I know how to assert myself and yet be an aweosme girlfriend all at the same time. My man FEELS loved, accepted, and so so so lucky. You’re right, this is what matters, and this is what true love is.
     
    @ Lynn #32:
    “So when I read Evan’s advice I take with me the most important parts: let the guy lead, let him shine, just be fun, show him what an incredible woman you are to be with. And all the other “date several people at once” advice… I kinda ignore ”
     
    I agree!
     
    Of course there is no need to obsess about marriage/be fearful of not being married when monogamy is the social norm, and when everyone values LTRs!
     
    I still do not obsess about marriage, but given how so many men in the US can date a woman for years without moving towards marriage (where marriage is still necessary for meaning of the relationship and benefits), I have to take some precautions in my dating life and make sure I’m quickly considered as wife material and not as “ongoing girlfriend” material. As Evan said, giving the best girlfriend experience to a man who is looking for a wife is the royal way to life commitment (if he gives me the nest boyfriend experience as well : ). The best girlfriend experience is one part of the equation, Making sure he is looking for a wife and willing to progress at a reasonnable pace towards making a decision in one way or another is the other!

36. Lynn 36

    @Tom
    You are right. I’ll go back to my sad corner now  

37. helene 37

    @ Tom

    On the issue of statuys, having been married for many years and now being single, I can definately say that I have experienced a loss of status. As the original topic of this blog points out, MOST people are married, when you get to a certain age, and simply being out of ther mainstream means that you are considered rather maerginal to society by a lot of people. Even though I have been single for 8 years now, am quite a confident assertive and atteactive person and have a high status job, I actually feel slightly embarrised a lot of the time about being single – like it makes me in some way deficient. There is still that aura of “no one wants you” about being a single woman – sure my close friends know that there are plenty of people who “want me” (it’s just that I don’t want to date THEM) but you can’t go around explaining that to everyone you meet!   I find that one of the most noticable areas where my status has changed is in the priority people give to seeing me, or coming to my house for dinner or just to visit. When I was married, if I invited people to my house they would usually come – but now I often get…”I’ll have to see what we’re doing, we were thinking we might go to the in-laws that weekend”. Coming all the way to my place just to have dinner with ME just seems like something married friends aren’t prepared to do – a whole evening, just to see ME?? Instead, I get invited to tag along to whatever they happen to be planning instead.

38. Tom 38

    @ Soul
    “what a strange comment and illogical answer”

    Sorry, you’re right I didn’t make that point very well at all. I meant to say that I was under the impression that polygamy was relatively common in South Africa, as epitomised by the elected head of state who has many wives; which is at odds with Clare’s insinuation that South African men are more inclined towards committed monogamous relationships than American men – I could be wrong though. I suspect there a lot of cultural phenomena there which I’m totally ignorant of.
    @ Lynn

    My smiley face to you didn’t work the last time
     
     
     

39. Ruby 39

    Tom #33
     
    I do think that society in general views still married women as more “normal” and “complete” than singles. Even older unmarried men are viewed as a bit “odd,” and as commitment-phobic. It’s interesting that the study in question only analyzes people aged 15-44. Why not those who are older? I know very few people marrying in the 15-17 age range anyway, so why not look at people aged 18 to 48? What about those over 45? None of my friends married before the age of 28, anyway, and those who did were soon divorced.
     
     

40. David T 40

    @Helene 37 These books will help you maintain your confidence and not feel embarrassed. This first one is excellent:
    http://www.amazon.com/Single-Being-Satisfied-Fulfilled-Independent/dp/1593371543
     
    I have only just cracked this second one. Doesn’t look as lighthearted and fun and is missing the great little exercises that pepper the first book, but it is pretty good.  The first chapter documents “singlism” (like racism.)
    http://www.amazon.com/Singled-Out-Singles-Stereotyped-Stigmatized/dp/0312340818
     
    Both books point out the absurdity behind a very common assumption: that everyone wants or should want to be in a coupled relationship and if you don’t it is only because you are depressed, afraid or generally a negative person. These books are good for anyone who wants to be happy as a single, whether they are looking for a partner or not.
     
    I also bought a book called Single 101 with 101 reasons to celebrate being single.  I have only glanced at it. It takes a  negative view, pointing out both minor and important annoyances in relationships that a single person does not have to deal with. I won’t be looking at that one much. I recommend it only in small doses unless schadenfreude is how you like to live. I bet my son’s mother would call it empowering and enjoy it. :->

41. Evan Marc Katz 41

    David – I’m not a fan of the author of your second link. She sees hatred towards singles when there’s only indifference.

    Fact is: married people who care about you only want for you to be HAPPY. If you’re happy being single, then none of us can judge. If you express that you’d really like to be in a relationship, we give advice and hope that you find love. That doesn’t mean you can’t be satisfied being single, but rather that you aspire to coupledom. These are the true feelings of married people. We’re way too caught up in our own relationships to spend much time worrying about yours.

42. Fiona 42

    Helen @ 37 – I hear you. I also find that my married friends are like that and my relatives are even worse. I therefore built up a network of other single women and gay men who do visit me and make me realise that I may not be married but Iam not alone. I also have some friends who have divirced and remarried and find them to be more understanding of my situation, I also understand what it is like in the office. I now work from home which is a huge relief because literally all anyone at work would ever talk about that was non work – related was their kids. Don’t get me wrong. I know that people are going to talk about their kids but I knew more about them than I did about my own niece. Efforts to turn conversation to anything else at all whether it be sport, current affairs, travel, films, opera were futile. in the end I just started avoiding them.

43. Clare 43

    Hi Tom

    You are perfectly right. The fear of AIDS has probably contributed in large part to the unwillingness to sleep around here. It’s just simply a little too risky. However I stand by my assertion that it’s also because we’re a more conservative society. People who have slept with many people are not regarded kindly, and there is a strong social approval of being in a committed relationship. It seems to reflect what most people want, as I have observed. I can’t remember ever hearing someone say they would rather be dating or having sex with multiple people, than being with the right person.

    As to your point about polygamy, you are perfectly right. Our president has 6 wives, 4 of them official. But bear in mind, there are 2 parallel and completely different cultures here. We have white, Western culture which is very much the same as European/American culture, except with a conservative past, and the push here is very much towards marriage and monogamous relationships.

    Then you have African culture, in which polygamy is widespread and legal. (It is only legal in an African cultural context. I would not be able to marry polygamously.) African women who do choose to marry polygamously are completely accustomed to this set-up and are afforded substantial financial protection under the law.

    Sorry for the long post, but I hope this clears up what you were asking.

44. Christine 44

    Thanks for the input everyone–I’m still working on my mindset. I’m trying to learn not to internalize it so much and take it personally when men want younger women. I did get a lot of encouragement from this article, that so many women in my cohort are somehow finding men who want to marry them.

    Well, I wonder if there really is such hatred towards singles. After all, doesn’t everyone (including married people) at least start off as single? And everyone can always become single again at any time (through divorce, break-ups, death of the partner, etc.) Everyone is single at one time or another, for some portion(s) of their lives. So in a sense, wouldn’t people hating singles also mean hating themselves? I’m still trying to logically reconcile that one…

45. Henriette 45

    @Christine44  I think that you overstate the “hatred” that married people feel for us singles.  In all honesty, the people who treat me as somehow “lesser than” because I’ve never been married are the same people who were threatened by me when I was slim & fit; dismissive of me when I put on weight; jealous of my million$; rude when I decided to leave the Rat Race and snide when I broke up with my decade+ relationship. 
    In other words, the small subset of folk who think less of us for being single are also the same kind of judgmental, narrow-minded folk who would think less of us for any life choice/circumstance that feel beyond the real of “normal.”  And for me, those people’s opinions matter not in the least. 
    I hope you’ll get to this point of not caring so much about the censure of a few unpleasant people, too.  Even though I’d love to be married, I also realise that being ashamed of being single would not only make me unattractive to potential partners but would also cast a shadow on my current life.
     
     

46. Tom 46

    Thanks for the clarification Clare – I didn’t realise that the two cultures were treated differently legally.
     
    I find it very interesting that Helene, Ruby and Fiona sense a difference in status between married and unmarried people. I have never noticed this before but that’s probably because the majority of my friends and colleagues are yet to marry. Is there a difference in status between a married couple and a couple just in a ltr?
     
    Like Fiona and Evan have said, most married people I know are so caught up in their own situation and children that they’re indifferent rather than dismissive towards singles.

47. Karl R 47

    helene said: (#37)
    “I actually feel slightly embarrised a lot of the time about being single – like it makes me in some way deficient.”

    During my late teens I came to the conclusion that awkward moments were an unavoidable part of life … but I could choose not to feel/act embarrassed about those moments.

    Most people will take their cues from you. If you act like you feel deficient, people will believe you’re deficient. If you act like you’re their equal, they’ll treat you like their equal.

    helene said: (#37)
    “Coming all the way to my place just to have dinner with ME just seems like something married friends aren’t prepared to do – a whole evening, just to see ME??”

    Believe it or not, the world doesn’t revolve around your marital status.

    If you put 2 women and 1 man in the same room for an extended period of time, the conversation for part of the time will be some form of “girl talk”. When you had a husband, the men could escape together. Now the man can’t conveniently escape. (Or do you keep a man-cave at your home?)

    And “girl talk” doesn’t become more interesting if the women are both married.

    Fiona said: (#42)
    “literally all anyone at work would ever talk about that was non work – related was their kids.”

    Single parents are just as bad about that as married parents.

    If parents are talking about their kids, does the conversation become more interesting if the parents are single?

    Boring conversations are boring, regardless of the marital status of those involved.

    Ruby asked: (#39)
    “It’s interesting that the study in question only analyzes people aged 15-44. Why not those who are older?”

    They’re from a generation where there were stronger stigmas against remaining single, so an even higher percentage of them (about 95%) got married.

    Henriette said: (#45)
    “the small subset of folk who think less of us for being single are also the same kind of judgmental, narrow-minded folk who would think less of us for any life choice/circumstance that feel beyond the real of ‘normal.’  And for me, those people’s opinions matter not in the least.”

    Well said.

    Of course, that does pose a difficult quandry for the singles who think less of themselves for being single. It’s probably harder for them to ignore that opinion.

48. helene 48

    @ Christine

    I didn’t say I thought there was a hatred towards sigle people, just that we don’t command equal status. When I was married, it was common for me to go to dinner on a saturday night with another couple. Now, its rare for me to get invited out to dinner with a couple, especially on a saturday. I do have some couple friends who are honorable exceptions, but others simply don’t invite you – and if you invite THEM to meet in a restaurant on a saturday you get the vague “I don’t know what we’re doing” thing, as though this is not a good enough plan to commit a saturday night to. Oddly, since I’ve been single, saturday night is generally the quietest night of my week – unless I happen to have a date.  

    Evan said “…  We’re way too caught up in our own relationships to spend much time worrying about yours ”

    I think that is a key part of the issue - other single friends may have an awareness of the fact that if you’re not seeing anyone right now, saturday night is likely to be a bit of a low point in the week, but I do find my married friends just don’t seem to quite take this in – they’ll invite you out for a quick drink on a thursday, but tend to forget about you at christmas, or at weekends. Its the same sort of phenomenon that childless people experience when their friends have babies – suddenly they just drop way down the hierarchy of importance. People who I have known for years, and have supported through so much seem to have forgotten what its like to be single (or they don’t want to remember!) Also, I think that those who were, say, single in their 20s think they know what being single is like, but its a very different ballgame in your 40s – no large groups of party people your own age always organising all sorts of stuff to do… in your 20s, most people are single, so although uit has its down moments, on the whole its ok to be single in your 20s – you’re one of the crowd, you;re not a misfit. This is very different later in life.

49. helene 49

    @ David T – thanks so much for the book recommendations – very thoughtful of you, and I think it would be useful for me to read something like that

50. Evan Marc Katz 50

    @Helene – You can’t have it both ways, my friend.

    Married people get married for the companionship, to build a family, to provide safety and support to each other. Almost ALL married people build this bubble in some regards.

    You have the choice to do the same – to immerse yourself in a relationship.

    And yet all I hear from the “why do people hate singles so much” crowd is either “I don’t want to be married” or “I can’t find anyone good enough”. If you don’t want to be married, you can’t be too upset that you’re single and that married people aren’t reaching out to you. And if you do want to be married, start dating a guy a week, choose a man of character who is kind and consistent, and you, too, can not care whether your friends are single.

51. Honey 51

    An amusing anecdote re: the status issue.  I had been with Jake for 6 years prior to our wedding.  Until we got married, EVERY TIME I talked to my dad, he pretended that he didn’t remember his name.  Since getting married, he not only uses the right name, he addresses emails to me as if they were to both of us and has several times mentioned he thinks Jake looks like Tom Cruise.  I was astonished.

52. David T 52

    @Evan41, 49  Thank you so much for your opinion of the second book.  I have not gone too much into it yet.  The first pages of the first chapter did look more like documentation and analysis than something helpful for me, so your eval will save me some time. Glad I bought it used.

    I think Judy Ford’s book is helpful for anyone who aspires to coupledom (or not) but is feeling unhappy being single or has self doubt to the point it impairs.  After all, how will you be a fun and relaxed date attract if you are not confident and happy? If Helene finds satisfaction and contentment with being single and still remains open to dating, she will improve her odds of attracting someone.
     
    For some it won’t as simple just dating a stream of kind and consistent guys. You have to be internally ready too. I am in curious place mentally/emotionally right now. Part of me does aspire to coupledom, and always will, yet in my dating I have found my heart closed to new women for many many months. I started to get excited sometimes, and I should be excited over the women I was meeting and going out with and enjoying company with. They were quality dates! Invariably, I would have one or more dates and never develop any sense of being drawn to them. I worked with a counselor on this all this year and now accept that where I am now I am not open to finding a new relationship. I have some inkling as to why, but it is not something that I have been able to change.
     
    One friend suggested some level of physical intimacy like making out is needed to develop that attachment, but that is not something I can do with only friendship attraction (and I have tried that). I do still feel physical attraction, but acting on that with someone I am not feeling romantic about is a dissonance I can’t accept for me and is misleading and hurtful to them.  This is the way I am wired now.
     

    I seek and have found peace and contentment as a single with friends of both genders. I am building what I can of  that bubble Evan spoke about without being part of a couple, though I know it will not be the same or as intense or as reliable.  This is part of preparing myself for the very real possibility that my last gf may have been the last one I will ever have, and to be happy with that.

    So why am on this blog?  I am still compassionate.  I am interested in learning how people work and I like the idea that I might be able to help someone get what they want.

    There is also that small part of me that reflexively says “Go ahead and be playful.  Flirt with her and get a date.” Part of me still hopes and wants which means eventually I might find myself open again. I won’t be going on a date a week, because that is too much disappointment. I will dip my toe back into dating from time to time to see if anything has changed within me, and this blog is good prep work.

53. Jane 53

    I’ve commented a couple of times, but I usually just lurk and read as much as time allows.  But I’m going to add this to my list of few times. It’s funny how the ensuing  comments are bookended by beliefs which stupify me.  A woman who is in her early 40′s should wait years to see when the man will decide, when the sand in her biological hourglass has virtually run out?  So often I hear exhortations of being practical, or rational, or merely stating facts here.  Well, here’s an absolute fact: you can’t have children forever.  If you’re in your 40′s that time is imminent.  If you’re in your mid to late 30′s, it still becomes tough.  That’s the time many women enter perimenopause, and while you can still give birth then, it is harder, and is prone to risk and/or complications.  Frankly, this is true for men as well, it’s just that it just keeps degrading for then, not ceasing outright.
     I have heard all the great stories of women who have given birth later, and much later in life (and thank you to everyone who has shared them here!).  But I have also heard stories of women who were limited to 1 child because either they entered the change, or kept having complications until they reached that point.  Or some women who never had children; it was too late.  Or even some who had them, who really wished they were younger, and feel the toughness of raising a toddler at an advanced age.  21 yr. olds get tired!  Now if someone doesn’t want kids, or is happy with the differing alternatives from being a step parent, to adopting, to just being a more metaphoric mom to a neighbor or god child, then feel free to ignore everything I just said. 

    I don’t think anyone is saying to force men to do anything; I know I’m not.  But a wise man, if he knows the woman’s age, would know that by waiting years until he figured out if he wanted to marry her is seriously compromising their chance of having a baby, if that is a desire.  And so it would be prudent for him to make up his mind sooner than later.  But if he doesn’t, and the woman is in the twilight of her childbearing years, and she wants children, then she would be wise not to accommodate herself to the man’s schedule when her ability is at stake, not his.  So advising women in their early 40′s to wait years when they would very much like to still have children, if possible, seems a kind of madness.  At best, lay the pros and the cons of both sides out, and let them decide.

    And a single person cannot expect her friends to come over for a nice Saturday dinner that she prepares?  That somehow you have to choose; that you can’t be single and expect to have married friends?  Whether you want a relationship or not is mutually exclusive to the desire for friendship.  And at least according to helene’s examples, if you can’t be bothered to show up at your friend’s house on the weekend either with or without your spouse, then how good of a friend can you really be?  And I think three sentient adults can come up with mutual conversation for a few hours for a dinner, or night/day out.  I’ve done it, as part of the couple, and as the single.  Is every single subject going to revolve around you?  No.  But then you don’t try and escape somewhere.  You listen.  And besides caring about, and wanting to know, the people your spouse cares about, isn’t that just basic level courtesy?

    I suspect though, that people are pretty firm in how they feel, so I just wanted to express my thoughts.  

    Thanks.

54. Karl R 54

    Jane asked: (#53)
    “A woman who is in her early 40′s should wait years to see when the man will decide, when the sand in her biological hourglass has virtually run out?”

    This link may help you understand our advice.

    If having (more) biological children is an imperative for the man, he’s not dating women who are 40+.

    The men in your dating pool aren’t sitting around thinking “How can I help Jane get married and start a family?” The men are thinking “How can I find a terrific wife?” or “How can I start a happy family?”

    People won’t do what you want unless it’s in their best interest. If you want a man to marry you, he has to believe it’s in his best interest.

    Jane said: (#53)
    “a wise man, if he knows the woman’s age, would know that by waiting years until he figured out if he wanted to marry her is seriously compromising their chance of having a baby, if that is a desire.  And so it would be prudent for him to make up his mind sooner than later.”

    Alternatively, he can pursue a different woman … one who is younger.

    Furthermore, a wise man will be interested in providing a happy, stable home environment for his child(ren) … and that will require a happy marriage. Figuring out whether a man/woman will make a great husband/wife takes time. And if your ovaries are shriveling and your eggs are dying, it still takes the same amount of time.

    Jane said: (#53)
    “the woman is in the twilight of her childbearing years, and she wants children, then she would be wise not to accommodate herself to the man’s schedule when her ability is at stake, not his.”

    If she wants a husband, she will have to wait.

    If she wants a child, she should go ahead and have them without him.

    Jane asked: (#53)
    “And besides caring about, and wanting to know, the people your spouse cares about, isn’t that just basic level courtesy?”

    Last week my fiancée and one of her friends and I went to watch the fireworks together. The two of them spent at least 2 hours gossiping about mutual acquaintances (whom I don’t know). That’s well beyond what I wanted to know about their friends and even further beyond what I cared about.

    Since I had the ability to go off, do other things and talk to other people, I wouldn’t call their behavior discourteous toward me. However, I would have viewed the situation differently if the same thing occurred over a dinner at her friend’s house.

    I don’t expect my fiancée to care about every person I care about. I don’t expect her to want to know everyone I care about. If those friends put some effort into getting to know her, that process will probably happen naturally … but that’s outside of our control.

    If you expect your spouse to unilaterally care about your friends, you’ve probably set your expectations too high.

55. Joe 55

    Jane,

    It has nothing to do with a wise man; any man knows a woman who’s 40 and wants kids is a ticking clock.  That doesn’t really change the timetable on whether or not he knows that he wants to marry her.  Does a woman with a ticking clock know any sooner that she wants to marry him?

56. Hope 56

    Regarding others’ comments about feeling they are in less demand, socially, as a single person…I think it just comes down to the “third wheel” concern, not to any deep-seated hatred. I am 32 and not yet married, but  as someone who has been, and is currently, in a serious relationship, I’m conscious of the fact that I am less likely to invite a single friend to hang out with me and my boyfriend only because it seems unbalanced. It sort of feels like, well if Single Sally is MY friend, wouldn’t everyone feel more comfortable if I go out with Sally on my own?  So that neither she nor my boyfriend feels like the third wheel?  Problem is, most of my scarce free time is spent with my boyfriend, by choice, without much time left over for single friends.  I’m not saying this is very nice, or very socially skillful, but I don’t think there’s much more to it than that, when it comes to singles being “left out” by their coupled friends.
    Also, if Single Sally is equally a friend to me and my man, but we met her when she was part of a couple, and she is now newly single, I think this strikes even MORE anxiety into the hearts of most typical couples, because not only are we afraid she’ll feel like the third wheel, but neither of us feels quite right inviting her out alone, because we’re so used to having our partner and her partner there.  Again– as I write this I know how silly and unfair it sounds, and I know there are some couples who are totally socially at ease with single friends.  But, if you have a lot of coupled friends who don’t seem to invite you out as much as when you were in a couple, I would bet this is why, not because they think less of you as a person.

57. Jane 57

    @ Joe:
    “Does a woman with a ticking clock know any sooner that she wants to marry him?”

    The best analogy, and admittedly not a great one, is a sale.  Maybe you’d like to have months to figure out whether you want to make a large purchase on something like, say, a car.  But there is a great deal you discovered, but the deal ends at the end of the month.  If you want to even contemplate that particular deal, you’d have to adjust your timetable, or forgo that car.  Everyone makes decisions based on the criteria that’s important to him or her.  So yes, if having a child is really important, then it should streamline the process in your 40′s in a way it doesn’t in your 20′s – and even that is not a hard and fast rule.  But, in general, I am of the opinion that as you age, you have a much better gauge of who you are, and what you want, so you don’t need as long to make a decision. 
    So do you make a decision in a day, a week, or even a couple of months? Generally no, but we’ve all heard stories of couples who have, married, and are still married.  And on a more fundamental level, you could spend decades with the person, and you’ll never truly know who s/he is.  But this is something that helene, and a few others have already articulated in the thread.  Clearly the majority here sees otherwise; I didn’t.

    @ Karl R:

    “This link may help you understand our advice.”

    Cute shirt, lol.  But I understand what is being said.  I don’t agree.  

    “If having (more) biological children is an imperative for the man, he’s not dating women who are 40+.”

    There is no need to talk for every man even in a particular state, let alone a country or several countries.  Even Evan, in his vehement disagreement didn’t do that.  He said most.  And sure, I’d agree most would not, but not all.  Even in that most, there may be some who would still be interested in older women.  And if their time frame matches, then great!  All you need is one.

    “The men in your dating pool aren’t sitting around thinking “How can I help Jane get married and start a family?” The men are thinking “How can I find a terrific wife?” or “How can I start a happy family?””

    You mean they’re not sitting around thinking about me?  I’m shocked!  I’m being tongue-in-cheek here.  But I never articulated that.  And the men around me are thinking all kinds of things, including a host of nefarious thoughts like, “What is the best way to be as vague as possible to get over on this woman, because I certainly don’t want an actual relationship!”  I was thinking hypothetically that if things were going well, and the man not just liked the woman, but loved her by then, then maybe he would decide to evaluate sooner than later.  I actually don’t see how this became such a radical thought considering this is the same advice one of Evan’s clients took in deciding to leave her boyfriend because she wanted children. It’s just she took as long as most of you are advocating, and I am just saying to shrink that time a bit, since your procreation time is shorter.
    And hey, if not, then at least honestly evaluate that, so that the two can part ways.  Which is why I ended with encouraging the woman to to decide what she values more.  Because, yes, the man is thinking about what is in his best interest.  So the woman needs to do the same, especially with something that ends.

    “Since I had the ability to go off, do other things and talk to other people, I wouldn’t call their behavior discourteous toward me. However, I would have viewed the situation differently if the same thing occurred over a dinner at her friend’s house.”
    I’m of two minds about it.  On the one hand, I think it’s discourteous either way.  You don’t even have to know the people in order to be included.  I have had conversations where two people were discussing mutually known others that I did not.  I would ask questions, they would fill me in with more details, and the conversations became robust, and sometimes even spun in different ways because I was a person outside the loop bringing a different POV.

    But other times I just listened.  I learned a lot about the people involved in both what they decided to gossip about, how they talked about it, what were their feelings on the information, etc.  I’ve done this with sports I know not so much about (because I actually do have a good working knowledge of sports in general).  I’ve done this in politics, where the people involved were discussing state races I had no clue about, since I didn’t live there.  In all those circumstances by listening to the back & fourth, I learned.  And it was that learning that made the conversation interesting.  But in a smaller dinner, I would expect a more balanced conversation, and a very intimate one-on-one, like the one you described, could be saved for when the two meet alone.

    “If you expect your spouse to unilaterally care about your friends, you’ve probably set your expectations too high.”

    Don’t think so.  I am not saying he has to like, or love every friend I have.  And I myself, have a small circle, and I am not talking about extended acquaintances, co-workers, etc.  But you care about the things your partner cares about, because s/he does.  If you and your fiancee see and do things differently, and it works for you, great.  It wouldn’t for me.  And if my good friend invited me over for dinners, maybe I wouldn’t take him all the time; I would go by myself, or with the kids, if we had any.  But sometimes, yes he does come over, because I care for her, so by extension he should, at least in theory.

    So to you both Karl R & Joe, thank you for your responses.  To even critique me, means you had to read it.  We just see things differently.

    Thanks.
     

58. Mia 58

    Hope – your perspective makes me sad and disgusted, but I can’t really blame you , since most attached women think this way. All I can say is, how would you feel if your bf died in a car accident or dumped you? Would you go crying to the single pals  you ditched , since the couple friends won’t want to be with you since you’re single again? It seems like there’s no point in having friends anymore bc they’ll ditch you as soon as they couple up. I ALWAYS maintained an active life outside of dating in case of a breakup. I was reading about a 30s wOman whose husband died after six years of marriage, and she acknowledged having vanished from her single friends, only to now feel sad and alone bc it was so hard having a single social life. I thought, well, she got what she deserved for her insular selfishness. 

59. Ruby 59

    It’s hard for me to imagine that a twenty-something would make a decision about marriage as quickly as a someone in their forties would. One of the ways we make decisions about who to marry is by comparing the people we’ve dated. Someone in their forties with much more relationship experience would find that easier to do than someone much younger. Ticking biological clock or not, someone 40+ has a much better sense of who they are and what they’re looking for than someone much younger.
     
     
    Karl R wrote: “Ruby asked: (#39)
    “It’s interesting that the study in question only analyzes people aged 15-44. Why not those who are older?”
     
    They’re from a generation where there were stronger stigmas against remaining single, so an even higher percentage of them (about 95%) got married.”
     
    Okay, but only 8% of 18-year-old women and 2% of 18-year-old males marry. I’m sure the percentage of 15-17 year olds is even smaller (not surprisingly), so I’m not sure of the value of studying people so unlikely to marry. It would be interesting to see how marriage rates have changed for an older demographic since the 1990′s.
     
     

60. Joe 60

    Jane, the trouble is: there’s always another sale on cars coming along.

61. Karl R 61

    Jane said: (#57)
    “I was thinking hypothetically that if things were going well, and the man not just liked the woman, but loved her by then, then maybe he would decide to evaluate sooner than later.”

    How much sooner? 1 year? 6 months? 3 months? 6 weeks?

    Evan and I recommend waiting until the infatuation (dopamine, norepinephrine, decreased seratonin) wears off. There’s a wide range of estimates about how long this takes, but they range from a few weeks to 3 years.

    This timeline is set by body chemistry. It doesn’t speed up for couples facing imminent infertility.

    The pitfalls of infatuation:
    “studies using functional imaging have suggested that brain activity in the prefrontal cortex – part of the brain that controls critical social judgement – lies pretty much idle when we are infatuated. It is only when the intense period of romantic euphoria wears off that our capacity for realism returns. Sometimes with dire consequences for the relationship.” – see source

    “Your brain sets you up to be hyper-focused on what you like about this one person and to discount or ignore the parts you don’t like, in order to facilitate the ‘getting together’ part of the mating process.” – see source

    Combining these two, it’s obvious how infatuation can set a couple up for a marital disaster.

    My infatuation (with my fiancée) started wearing off around the 9 month mark. It was completely gone by the time I proposed. But I don’t know when my fiancée’s infatuation wore off. Perhaps it hasn’t yet. While I’m certain that I’ve made a chemical-free decision to marry her, I can’t be absolutely certain that her decision to marry me was (initially) chemical free.

    By now I’m sure, because we’ve waited long enough to get past the infatuation point.

    Jane said: (#57)
    “There is no need to talk for every man even in a particular state, let alone a country or several countries.”
    “Even in that most, there may be some who would still be interested in older women.  And if their time frame matches, then great!  All you need is one.”

    There are 10.8 million single men between the ages 35 and 49. Do you have time to date them all? If you narrow it down to a single state, do you have time to date them all?

    If a woman is in her early 40′s, how many men does she have time to date before her “imminent” infertility closes that door? 100? 50? 25? Whatever number she has time for, she needs to find one in that group.

    The “All you need is one” strategy worked wonderfully for me … but I had the option to spend decades searching.

    Jane said: (#57)
    “Even in that most, there may be some who would still be interested in older women.”

    You’re also glossing over one of the more important points. I’m engaged to an older woman. I know numerous other men who are dating women in their 40s, 50s and 60s.

    But these men don’t want kids (or more kids).

    Let’s say a man (who wants kids) marries a woman in her early 40s (who wants kids). At that age, they’re likely to have some difficulty conceiving. There’s a substantial risk that she’ll go through menopause before having a child.

    You need to find a man who is willing to take the risk that they won’t have kids before menopause. The men most willing to take that risk are the men who are ambivalent about having kids.

    Jane said: (#57)
    “if having a child is really important, then it should streamline the process in your 40′s in a way it doesn’t in your 20′s”

    If having a child is “really important” to the man, he’s unlikely to want to take the risk of marrying a woman in her early 40s. If he’s ambivalent about having kids (and therefore willing to take the risk), he lacks the motive to “streamline the process.”

    But as you pointed out, “All you need is one” man …
    … who is willing to have kids
    … who is willing to to risk infertility by marrying a woman who is over 40
    … who wants to marry a woman he is still getting to know
    … who is willing to rush into marriage
    … who is willing to increase his risk of a failed marriage by rushing into marriage
    … who would make a good husband and father (even though you haven’t taken the time to get to know him fully)
    … who thinks you would make a great wife and mother (even though he hasn’t taken the time to get to know you fully)

    It’s possible to find a man like this, but you’re not likely to find one quickly.

    Jane said: (#57)
    “I actually don’t see how this became such a radical thought considering this is the same advice one of Evan’s clients took in deciding to leave her boyfriend because she wanted children.”

    Which client? Evan has talked about dozens of his clients.

62. Fiona 62

    I am not convinced that it is a such good idea to allow a man to wait until his chemistry has worn off. That sounds like a much higher risk strategy for women than for men and a certain way to be repeatedly emotionally investing and repeatedly being dumped to me which is fine if you don’t mind having lots relationships with lots of different men which most women do not and certainly not fine if the biological clock is nearing the end. Dating is not fun for most women  - personally I feel all of my previous relationships were a total waste of my time because they have not resulted in marriage and children. Continuing to date now for a few years is not just risking yet more heartache if it ends but more importantly putting my ability to have children in other peoples’ control. I am seriously considering having children with a gay friend now than holding out. Obviously this is not the ideal but when the window to have children is gone, it is gone and no man can compensate for that. 

63. Soul 63

    I, too, don’t think it’s a good idea to wait until the chemistry is completely gone. Furthermore, I don’t think it is a good idea to follow somebody who does not want children’s strategy (e.g. Karl) if you want to have children. The thinking processes won’t be the same and, according to me, the meaning behind such concepts as “love/family/couple/giving/hope/sacrifice/faith and confidence in the future/ purpose of life” won’t be either. Your strategy needs to be in accordance with your values, your objectives, and your dreams. 

    Those people who explain everything by referring to hormones (dopamine, oxytocine etc.) themselves acknowledge that those hormones are released for a purpose: for people to mate and have children sooner than later. Sure, you do not want to be BLIND to hormones, but you still need some kind of hormonal “high” for life to thrive.

64. Helen 64

    Fiona and Soul: Believe me, I sympathize and understand where you’re coming from. But if you don’t “allow a man” to wait till the stage of infatuation is gone, then you may be forcing him into a marriage that he doesn’t really want, and that YOU may not really want. You need to see each other clearly, with no fog of infatuation, to know if you’d be happy together for decades to come. (And really, are you in the position to say that you allow your man to do this or that? It sounds controlling.)

    Also, forcing a man into marriage before infatuation wears off isn’t fair to the man. It sounds as though one of the main reasons you want marriage is to have children.  Now, that’s fine, but it doesn’t sound as though it’s much about the man at all, other than ensnaring him for sperm.  Marriage is about the partnership of two people, with or without children.  If you look at him as a tool just to get something else you want (kids), can you blame him for being resistant?  No, you have to be happy with EACH OTHER, and not expect kids to make everything worth it.  The compatibility absent infatuation is crucial for all the rest of your life.

65. Mia 65

    Isn’t the bigger issue why a woman at such a late stage of childbearing years has waited so long? Obviously, shit happens, things don’t always work out how you want, but for a woman who seriously wanted children and put serious effort from age 25 or even 30 into finding a spouse, wouldn’t she have found one before she was pushing 40? Or are these women who got divorced in their 30s and are now back out there? I don’t mean to judge, I’m just trying to understand what the reasons would be for waiting so late. I’m still a little skeptical of Evan’s 3 years to marriage advice, if a woman is older, but fairly or not, I’m sure a man who wanted children would prefer a woman who wasn’t in such a position.

66. Fusee 66

    Hi Mia @65: Although I’m not in this situation (33 and a uterus that came with no clock) I can see how a woman could find herself in such predicament if she had followed routine dating advice or simply her naturally accomodating and easy-going personality of being “cool”, “going with the flow”, and “respecting his pace”. (Do not get me wrong, I find this advice priceless at the early stage of dating, but I believe that women also need “relationship” advice, not just “dating” advice). 
     
    Imagine a good woman who would experience two or three serious multi-year relationships between age 25-35. Each time she can reasonably believe that it will lead to marriage and children (her desire from the beginning) but the first time she realizes they’re not really compatible (still learning what true compatibility is), the second time the man ends up “not being ready” in his still early thirties after years of telling her he will “eventually” want to be married (still learning how to evaluate a man’s potential to become “ready”), and the third time, well one of the above happened again, or, well s*** happened. She is now 35+, not only slightly burned-out by the break-ups of three serious relationships where she puts lot of energy in, but now also rightfully worried about the passing of time.
    I could be in that predicament. I had a seven-year relationship in-between two (more or less) one-year relationships, all in my late teens and twenties. I ended all of them and never wanted children, so time has never really been an issue for me on that regard. If the men had ended these relationships while I was expecting marriage and kids, I could very well be in the sad situation so many women describe. Sure, some women wait too long to take their love lives seriously (we can sympathize with them instead of blaming them by the way), some remain involved with the wrong man for years (who has not tried “too hard” at some point in their lives?), some simply “allow” a man to take way too much time to become “ready”…
     
    Am I saying we need to rush and/or force men into marriage? Certainly not. Who wants a marriage based on such terms, especially if kids will be part of it? I’m suggesting to start from scratch with a man who is already ready to consider marriage and who knows what he needs to look for, and whose job will simply focus on evaluating you and the relationship, while you’re doing just the same. Men like that exist! They sadly have no clue on how to go from there, so they need a partner who does. It will still require time (no kidding, as Evan says, it’s a 40+ year decision!), but it does not need 3 years, unless you still do not know what you want and how to create it, you are very young, have a track record of poor decision-making in relationships, or are afflicted by these “chemical highs”, “hazes”, and “crazy infatuations” for more than a few weeks.
     
    I experienced these feelings once in my twenties and I understood their danger. They indeed made me stay in a relationship for longer than its expiration date. I now choose partners who do not make me go insane. The high with my current boyfriend lasted six weeks and it was still rather moderate. Just the delight of receiving attention from a good man after years of solo living. Since then I’ve been getting to know the very real him, with flaws, heavy conversations, conflicts, and all. The difference was that he was already open to talking about marriage since he was hoping to build a life-long relationship at some point in his life. He did not feel threatened by the M word. He did not equate “talking about marriage and its meaning” with “being coerced into marriage”. He understood that I was evaluating him as well, not just “waiting for a proposal since date #3″.
     
    Of course I agree with the concept of avoiding to make a “chemical”-based decision and with the concept of respecting the pace of the slowest partner. Let’s be careful, but let’s not make/accept new excuses to delay taking responsability.

67. Karl R 67

    Fiona said: (#62)
    “I am not convinced that it is a such good idea to allow a man to wait until his chemistry has worn off. That sounds like a much higher risk strategy for women than for men and a certain way to be repeatedly emotionally investing and repeatedly being dumped to me which is fine if you don’t mind having lots relationships with lots of different men which most women do not”

    Option 1 (which Evan and I recommend)
    You give a man enough time for the infatuation to fade. He decides that there’s not enough connection to sustain a marriage. He breaks up with you.

    Option 2 (which you recommend)
    You marry the same man before the infatuation fades. After the infatuation fades, he decides there’s not enough connection to sustain a marriage. (Possibly after reproducing.) He divorces you.

    Would you rather be repeatedly dumped, or would you rather have a series of short, unhappy marriages? As Helen implied (#64), the men who dump you aren’t the men who are going to spend decades married to you.

    Soul said: (#63)
    “Sure, you do not want to be BLIND to hormones, but you still need some kind of hormonal ‘high’ for life to thrive.”

    Are you saying that the hormones are necessary for successful fertilization? If so, you’re wrong. You can get a happy, healthy baby from artificial insemination using two parents who don’t give a rat’s ass about each other.

    Or are you saying that the parents in the family need the hormonal “high” in order to thrive and feel alive in their marriage? If that’s what you believe, you’re going to have a series of short marriages. The dopamine, oxytocin and seratonin levels return to normal in three years (usually much sooner). If you believe that you and your husband will be exceptions, you’re engaging in magical thinking.

    Soul said: (#63)
    “Your strategy needs to be in accordance with your values, your objectives, and your dreams.”

    If your strategy isn’t in accordance with reality, you’re setting yourself up for failure.

    While many married couple stay together longer ”for the sake of the children”, they’re miserable doing so. Either you choose a spouse that you can happily grow old with, or you set yourself up for divorce.

68. Clare 68

    I think you make a very good point, Mia. I would imagine it is not a pleasant thing to be facing that kind of time pressure, racing against the biological clock if you will, not just for the man, but especially for the woman. It would be more ideal if women could start the process of seriously evaluating potential spouses in their early to mid twenties.

    And yet the irony is that many women that age have a more laid back approach to their love lives, are studying or building their careers, having fun with their friends, and also are perhaps not the best judge of whom to marry as they still have growing up and self-exploration to do.

    What is a good compromise? I think late twenties is when we should be making finding a serious partner top priority.

    I agree wholeheartedly with Helen @ 64 though. I think the best way to find yourself married, to say nothing of happy and satisfied, is to cultivate love, not by any combination of forcing or allowing. The problem with women who want to lay down their timelines and use this to “encourage” men to step up is, as Evan is often saying, that they have no leverage.

    Whilst oxytocin, dopemine, seratonin and the other feel-good hormones which are present in the infatuation stage are great and it might be tempting (if you were so inclined) to “take advantage” of these, you might be missing that there is an even greater bonding agent which comes with time: attachment. Two people who have invested in understanding each other and becoming close over time are less likely to leave each other than those under the spell of those infatuation feel-good feelings.

69. Fiona 69

    Helen @64 – I don’t want to control men nor do I just want to use them for their sperm. I would like to be a loving wife and a mother but at 37, if a man needs to take years, I am afraid that I can realistically probably only be one of those things. I don’t think a relationship that lasts for years at this time of life could end in a happy marriage anyway unless neither party wants children. No matter how reasonable it may be for a man to take his time to be sure, I think it would be hard for a woman to marry someone willing to let her clock wind down until it stops without resenting him. If the man also wants children then she also runs the risk that he leaves anyway and finds someone who can.

    Mia@65 – That is a good question – it isn’t a case of choosing to wait too long so much as it just didn’t work out. I always wanted a husband and children, and have been actively trying to meet the right man for at least the last 10 years, thinking I’d met him, watched him leave, then had to recover from heartbreak before being able to start again. I have changed my approach a lot in the last year. However, it hasn’t worked out yet (another 3 month relationship bit the dust last weekend) and time is starting to run out. It really kills me to say that I am seriously looking at going down the artificial insemination route with a gay friend but it may be my best chance to be mother although I am still hesitating a bit because I really would rather have children out of love. As for men preferring a woman that isn’t in this situation, I agree – I am sure that most would.

70. Soul 70

    @Helen, #64:

    Who’s talking about “forcing” a man? I have never forced anybody and literally all my boyfriends wanted to marry me (except the current one, who does not believe in marriage…still I love him….and we are starting a family….oh, yes!!! I’m French ahahahaha).

    I did not picture my life with my previous partners so I chose to keep looking despite my age, because I have faith in the future… this is just who I am, I have always been optimistic (Mia, i hope that answers your question? some of us just choose to keep looking until we find the one!! Unfortunately you do not really decide when it happens, or even if it will happen!!!)

    Helen, what you are saying corroborates what I said: people who want a family, and not only a husband will not make the same decisions as people who only want a husband (the way I am phrasing this is awkward, but by “family” I mean including children) . For me, both are inseparable and I do not picture my life with only a husband, nor do I picture my life with only children… I want both (God willing, of course). 

    In the end, I think it all comes down to people’s personality: some people are risk-avoiders and news to plan things ahead, take their time and waiting for a long the suits their need (those people ar often on the conservative side btw); on the other hand, others are more of the spontaneous type and trust their feelings, make decision pretty quick but are still attuned to their needs… both can make mistakes, and both can form happy families for life. I deeply believe, however, that if you d not adapt your strategy to your personality you are doomed to fail….

71. Fiona 71

    Karl @67 – if I were ten years younger or ten years older I might be OK with this proposition but right now, if I am going to be left, I would rather take the risk of being left holding the baby than left grieving the loss of being able to have babies. I don’t see how that means that there would be a series of short term marriages afterwards – the biological clock issue would disappear and there would be the luxury of time.

72. Mia 72

    Fusee, I guess you have a good point about dating advice encouaging women to be too cool. I really have no personal experience to go off of here, because, while I had four long term relationships fom 18-25, I was too young to be evaluating anybody for marriage potential, and in the few years since then it’s just been a few short term things that never led to exclusivity. But I do hear a lot about how women should NEVER mention marriage, never question the progress of the relationship, and this would seem to put women at a serious disadvantage.  At the least, I wonder whether women should maybe wait a lot longer until becoming exclusive with a man – maybe even 4 months or longer – so they don’t end up wasting time with people who are clearly not going to step up and who aren’t ready or compatible. Still, a certain amount of time is needed.
    I thought I met my soulmate at age 21, and he became one of the closest friends I’d ever had, but after six months of dating he abruptly ended things and changed as a person. At the nine month mark in other relationships, I realized it probably wasn’t going to work. Even after a year you probably still don’t know enough about whether you’d grow bored with each other or have what it takes to form an enduring bond. I also detect no real pattern in how a guy will treat me or how into me he will be based on how good looking he is, how much he makes, whether we were friends for a long time first or just met on a blind date or online,
     so how exactly do you find these men, Fusee, who are from the beginning marriage minded?

73. Soul 73

    @ KArl, # 67 

    You said: If your strategy isn’t in accordance with reality, you’re setting yourself up for failure.
    While many married couple stay together longer ”for the sake of the children”, they’re miserable doing so. Either you choose a spouse that you can happily grow old with, or you set yourself up for divorce. 

    Many married people stay together for the sake of  ”staying married” as well, and they are nonetheless miserable. 

    There is no such thing as ONE reality. There has never been.

74. Jane 74

    How is advocating women to be mindful of their biological clock, IF they want kids, and especially IF they are older has been equated to forcing men to do anything?  This seems like an unnecessarily extreme and exaggerated proposition.  Fusee & Soul have already expressed it, so I won’t re-invent the wheel.

    But I want to address what you asked about Mia.  I agree with you that this process should start earlier, and I think it is happening now.  And I liked how others have described the varying personal reasons that can leave a woman in that situation.  But I want to take a more macro look at what could have happened.

    This seems to me most akin to the U.S. job crisis. in the   Technology isn’t the only thing changing at such a rapid pace, many aspects of culture are as well. In terms of the job market, many later boomers grew up understanding that you commit to a company, you get a pension, the end.  Gen xers didn’t, so as the economy radically left that paradigm, it was just more of the same.  And millenials, seeing the playing field, have an entirely different mindset.  Did this hurt everyone?  No, some people already had careers that mimicked the new climate, some others did end up working for companies that more or less fulfilled that agreement.  But many found themselves w/o a job, and without immediate coping strategies to acclimate to the new standard.

    It’s not exactly the same, but it’s similar.  Part of that “you can have it all myth” was the idea that you could focus on your career when you’re younger, and then have your family and career in your 30′s.  And we’ve not only seen the results of that, but discussed it recently (via the Atlantic article).  But in terms specifically of child-bearing, how often were women told that you can just do it in your 30′s?  The increased difficulty was not publicly discussed until recently.  And while menopause is often talked about, we still hear very little about perimenopause, which can also seriously affect your ability to procreate.

    But what’s also changed is the sentiment that actually initiated the article [I was so taken aback by people encouraging older women who wanted children to vet a man for years, that it focused my response attention].  But no, I don’t think most people get married.  Not anymore.  If people were still getting married, the percentages would shift, age up accordingly, but the very end percentages would stay about the same.  They don’t.  More people aren’t marrying, ever.  This is very different from what our boomer/greatest gen parents grew up with. You can see this especially in the chart Paragon posted, but I’ve seen CDC numbers that specifically focus on never marrieds, breaks down across time, by gender, ethnicity, and the entire age spectrum.

    In speaking of ethnicity, I think it is also helpful to look at some of the smaller subsets of the group, because things are not equal.  In the CDC chart, when they do a general snapshot, not broken down by age, the never married rate for ’06-’10 is 38.2%.  But when you break it down ethnically, for U.S. born latinas the never-married rate is 49.3%, and the african american rate is a staggering 55.1%.  Now they don’t further break down the numbers according to age, but I have seen those; the numbers for african american females in their late 30′s and early 40′s are still noticeably low, and far lower than the 8 in 10 average cited at the head of the article.

    These numbers are interesting too when you look at the most recent article about single vs. married moms.  Less than 10% of OOW births occur with women who hold a bachelor’s or higher, while those with a diploma or less is 61%.  So if we are talking about degreed women, for them, no marriage, no child.  But then when that marriage doesn’t materialize, and you are at the end of your fertility, it does create the need for tough choices.

    And much like the analogy above, this didn’t affect some women, and possibly even many, but there was a portion of women who were caught in the vice of a changing social scene, or one that was advocated, but never truly materialized.  And I just don’t want them to give up yet, if it’s important to them, and if they still have some time.

    @ Karl: “Which client? Evan has talked about dozens of his clients.”
    This is long, so I may not get to all the responses I wanted, but I wanted to at least highlight this one here, since it concludes what I was saying.

    I was referring to the “Become the Woman that No Man Can Ever Leave” thread; the one that caused a dual issue when some people weren’t thrilled about the age difference, and others were concerned about the man being a possibly ambivalent father (what you brought up, actually).  Here are some snippets:

    “But all relationships have their challenges, and Mark and Michelle were no different.  The elephant in the room for this couple was that Michelle very much wants to have kids, while Mark never really anticipated that he’d be a father again in his 50’s.”

    “Most importantly, from our work together, Michelle knew that her future husband wants to be a dad, and thus, she had no regrets about walking away when she did.”

    “After spending a year and a half together, Mark realized that he couldn’t imagine life without her.”

    “Know that this is within your grasp and that true love will find you sooner rather than later – as long as you prioritize your love life like Michelle did.”

    This is all I’m basically advocating, just with a slightly streamlined timeline.  Just like Michelle knew her husband was going to be a father, and was ok walking away when he changed his mind and didn’t want children, so should an older woman feel, if that is what she really wants.  And just like they spent approximately  1.5 years only before tying the knot, it’s not such a leap to imagine that this can be determined in a year.  

    At no point have I argued that this was easy.  Both men and women put off marriage.  But when men reach similar ages, many do simply decrease their range to the 20′s to early 30′s; their female contemporaries?  Pretty stuck.  Younger women, seeing what’s going on, won’t have the same problem.  But  I know the numbers are not on the older women’s side.  But like I said, all you need is one.  So why not give it a chance?  Worse case scenario: you look, no one’s there, and you enter menopause.  I mean, maybe you even do it at an earlier that usual age.  Then you can just switch gears, look for a partner, and take the more cautionary time frame that is being advocated here.

75. Karl R 75

    Fiona said: (#71)
    “if I am going to be left, I would rather take the risk of being left holding the baby than left grieving the loss of being able to have babies.”

    Then take the option Lori Gottlieb did. Go have the baby. You don’t need a man in order to start that.
     
    Fiona said: (#69)
    “As for men preferring a woman that isn’t in this situation, I agree – I am sure that most would.”

    Especially if they’re aware of the risk of divorce associated with rushing.
     
    Fiona said: (#69)
    “I really would rather have children out of love.”

    Women get sole custody 66% to 75% of the time (depending upon whether the custody is contested). In the case of a divorce, men run a significant chance of ending up not raising their children.

    If you knew that a divorce was likely to result in you losing your children (as well as your spouse), would you be willing to take a chance on a hasty, risky marriage?

76. Fiona 76

    Karl @75 – unfortunately I am probably going to be forced to do just that and lead half a life unless I can find a man willing to take a chance who realises that I am actually someone worth taking a chance on.

    You cannot assume that, if I do, the man will be miserable for life or desperate to divorce me either (or vice versa). However, the man prepared back to stand back for 3 years and watch me break my heart over infertility is not my future husband as he is showing that he isn’t the kind of man prepared to make compromises to adapt to the reality of a situation that I can’t change and worse that he really doesn’t care about what I want at all. 

    I am not sure that taking all the 35-40 year old women that want children out of the marriage pool while they raise children alone wouldn’t leave a lot of lonely unmarried men out there.

77. Soul 77

    Fiona said: (#71)
    “if I am going to be left, I would rather take the risk of being left holding the baby than left grieving the loss of being able to have babies.”
    Karl replied: (#75)
    Then take the option Lori Gottlieb did. Go have the baby. You don’t need a man in order to start that.

    I have never been comfortable with black or white thinking….The duration of the courtship/dating phase before tying the knots (I’m summarizing the idea) is not the sole predictor of a good/bad marriage, far from it actually (there are other determinants: for example, age is a stronger predictor… how does that enter the equation here?  I hang out several times a week with university profs who do scientific research and present their results all around the world on those subjects…if people are old enough, there are many successful marriages where people got married in the first two years….  there is TON OF SCIENTIFIC PROOF for that…don’t be shy, just do a google scholar search and you’ll find it). 

    This blog is for Strong, SMART, successful women…and a smart woman/man is nuanced in her/his arguments; it is obvious but you can have A & B being true the same time.

    Speaking of nuance…..We do need and want a (good) man to start a family. Like most women, (I suppose) Fiona does not want to have a baby by herself; she wants to have a family. However, in the worst case scenario, i.e. should her marriage fail, she stills prefers to experience the joy of being a mother while she can. There lies the nuance….. Is this hard to grasp ? it is not only about being a mother. But you have to adapt to the situation/variables. 

78. Fusee 78

    @ Mia #72: “…so how exactly do you find these men, Fusee, who are from the beginning marriage minded?”
     
    Mmm if I knew of a special fishing spot and if I disclosed it to women, I would have many friends, wouldn’t I? ; )
     
    Since I do not believe that such men hide anywhere special, I simply avoid places that attract a disproportionately high number of players/lazy men/non-committal men, such as bars and online dating sites. Serious men are there too, of course, but in much less density, so it’s less likely to run into them in those places compared to in real life where all populations are more equally represented.
     
    I’ve indeed always met men in person because I do not do online dating, blind dates, etc. I’d rather rely on the magic of two people being brought to the same place at the same time. Yes it might not be the “most effective”, but how natural it is! It respects natural rythmes and natural ways of interacting with others. It allows our natural intuitions to kick in. A screen and a keyboard will never replace these subtle energies.

79. Mia 79

    Fusee – I agree that online dating has its limitations and I do not rely on it exclusively. However, meeting people in even the best of real life situations has not protected me from men who will hurt me. The last man who really disappointed me, I met through a friend. The man who hurt me the most in my life is a guy I met in a meditation class. I met a guy in kind of a cute way at a sports bar, and we went on one date and he didn’t call me (he wasn’t particularly cute or special, but it was annoying, as we’d had a really good conversation). Another man who hurt me was just a bald, average looking, really fun guy that worked in the same place and we’d frequently go out for drinks together. I’ve met several other guys through friends recently and we became very close platonic friends who hang out together constantly, so there was no big loss that we mutually didn’t feel attraction. Anyway, I just find it difficult to discern upfront whether people are marriage minded and are going to be into me for a long time – for the most part, these guys don’t come off as slick, suave players that girls are banging down their door for. They’re just normal men.

80. Karl R 80

    Soul said: (#77)
    “The duration of the courtship/dating phase before tying the knots (I’m summarizing the idea) is not the sole predictor of a good/bad marriage,”

    I agree. But time gives us the opportunity to get to know our partner better. And with that knowledge, we can better understand whether many of the stronger predictors are present.

    According to one marriage therapist, “The number one predictor of divorce is the habitual avoidance of conflict.”
    
    How do you expect to find out if your partner habitually avoids conflicts unless you take the time to find out? If you have a partner whom you generally agree with (someone with high compatability), you’re probably not having disagreements regularly.

    And if you’re still infatuated, you have a high tendencey to ignore the other person’s faults, so you’re less likely to be having arguements.

    The “Seven Predictors of Divorce” by Focus on the Family all relate to how the couple resolves disputes.

    I had been dating my fiancée for more than two years before we had our first significant dispute.

    Soul said: (#77)
    “for example, age is a stronger predictor…”

    Can you find any data that predicts that a woman married at 40 is less likely to get divorced than a woman who gets married at 26? Every study I’ve seen lumps those women together. Over the age of 25, nobody considers age to be a sufficient predictor to bother collecting data on.

    According to one Ph.D. marriage counselor:
    Getting married at 16 gives you a 90% chance of divorce.
    Having one or more negative ways of fighting gives you a 85% to 90% chance of divorce.

    On par with those two were “Putdowns and Discounts” and “Looking for evidence that you are not okay.” (The latter being common to people with abandonment fears.)

    And finally, “Major Cultural and Religious Differences,” which you would think would be immediately discernable. However, “People living next door to each other and going to the same church may have equally pronounced differences in their families.”

    That’s four additional predictors which are nearly as bad as getting married at 16 (which most people consider foolish). And all of them can be detected in advance if you take enough time getting to know your partner.

    According to Dr. Gottmann, the following traits are a 94% predictor of divorce early divorce (on average, 5 1/2 years after the marriage):
    Contempt:  statements made by one partner to the other from a position of arrogance and superiority (the number one predictor).
    Criticism: stating one’s complaints about their partner as if they are a character defect.
    Defensiveness: self-protection in the form of moral indignation and victimhood.
    Stonewalling:  stopping communication with your partner by withdrawing emotionally.

    Again, these are not traits that appear early in the dating process.

    Soul said: (#77)
    “there are many successful marriages where people got married in the first two years….”

    True. But if you get married early, you don’t know whether or not you have the traits that lead to divorce. You’re gambling … and sometimes luck is with you.

    Sometimes it isn’t.

    Fiona believes the risk associated with waiting is worse than the risk associated with taking the gamble. That’s likely true for her. It’s not necessarily true for the men she’s meeting. Of course, some men are more willing to gamble than others … but gamblers and risk takers might not be ideal husband/father material.

    Jane sees one man who was willing to take a chance at 1 1/2 years, and believes that means there are men out there who would be willing to take a risk at 1 year. Heck, there are probably men willing to take a risk at one week, but I think you’ll find the numbers drop as you speed up the time frame.

    If you’re hunting for a smaller pool of men, it usually takes longer to find someone.

81. Evan Marc Katz 81

    Right on, Karl. My wife and I got engaged before a year and a half because a) I was a dating coach with LOTS of previous experience and b) I was anxious about childbearing. My wife pressuring me certainly wouldn’t have helped any. Every other close couple I know (my five best friends) took 3 years before getting engaged, including ones with wives in their late 30′s early 40s.

    Next, I was at Michelle and Mark’s wedding this weekend. They didn’t get engaged in a year and a half – closer to 2 1/2 years and the marriage was at around 3 years. The obstacle they overcame at 18 months was about kids. And, as it turns out, they decided NOT to have kids, even thought that was the original sticking point. Funny how people arrive at mutually agreeable conclusions when they love each other, communicate well, and take their time to figure things out as a couple.

    Finally – and I’ll probably write a newsletter about this today – I met a bunch of people at the wedding who learned what I did. And every single one of them agreed with my central premise – you can’t pressure men to do anything that’s not on their timetable. The attempts to do so will only backfire. You’ll tell yourself that he didn’t really want marriage/kids with you, but the truth is that he didn’t want to be pressured into marriage/kids with you. He will CHOOSE it with the woman who gives him time to do so.

82. Helen 82

    Evan: what an interesting twist to the story. Best wishes to Michelle and Mark. It sounds as though they made the right choice, given their circumstances. Mark should know what a treasure he has in Michelle, making that type of compromise for his sake.
     
    About your last paragraph: it reminds me of a quote either you or one of your commenters wrote, “If you tell a man to do something and he does it, he is not a man.” It applies to women as well, and it’s not so much about being a “man” or a “woman,” but being an adult who knows how to make decisions independently. Of course, we might wind up doing something another person wanted, but it should be because we weighed the options and made the choice that made most sense. In any case, we want someone who wants to be with us, not someone we pressured into being with us.
     
    Karl: all points agreed with respect to conflict and handling it respectfully.
     
    Fiona and Soul: the good news is that men (and you) don’t necessarily need YEARS to make a decision, to be free of infatuation, or to have a conflict that shows each others’ true colors. So, don’t go into this thinking the worst. Stay optimistic, be real, and state what you want with a smile to men. Don’t be upset if they can’t give you what you want immediately. Playing it cool and pleasant often brings the best outcomes soonest.

83. Fusee 83

    Thank you, Karl #80 for bringing up this useful information. I think it will enlighten many who are not yet educated on these proven predictors of divorce (and predictors of any relationship troubles I would add). A successful relationship is about character, and we not only need time to discover someone’s character but opportunities to let it show. There is no way you can have a decent relationship where contempt, criticism, defensiveness, and stonewalling are part of the picture. Those are relationship killers, not just of marriage, but of friendship, of family relationships, of business relationships, etc.
     
    Rather than debate on timelines, which are going to be different for each individual, it might be more useful to encourage people to – despite chemical highs – take a serious look at their prospective partner’s character and develop their own character qualities further. Rather than saying that one year is enough, or that we absolutely need three years to make a wise decision, we could focus on what we do with our courtship time, and what our specific relationship needs before moving to the next level. It’s going to look very different between your relationship and mine, depending on how experienced you are, your personalities, how sensitive you are to chemicals, what opportunities to learn about your partner’s character you run into, and a variety of individual circumstances. As Evan said @81, his own circumstances led him to follow a different timeline for his relationship, and it worked out well for him and his wife because although he did not have the ideal amount of time, he did have everything else to make a wise decision.
     
    I applaud warning people about chemicals and predictors of failure. But making the passing of time the “be all and end all” of courtship is equally dangerous, as it encourages people to just “go with the flow” for three years while not necessarily working on their character and exploring their future goals and compatibility. More time sure is a great benefit but it is not sufficient either. It has to be used wisely by becoming a better life partner and staying on “evaluation” mode instead of slipping into a routine.
     
    If both parties feel the need for three years, great. How about they make their preliminary goal to have a pre-decision made at the 18-month mark, and then take an additional year to confirm it? At least they would really be working on something, and the most marriage-attached party will know that their partner is serious about marriage.
     
    @Mia #79: Relationships hurt. I’ve been hurt my fair share and I’ve hurt too. It’s not because the guy is marriage-minded or even has become your awesome boyfriend that you are not going to be hurt. Just two weeks ago I experienced the worst pain I had experienced in almost five years, simply by listening to my boyfriend’s perspective on something related to our relationship. And he truly is a good man and treats me with the utmost respect and love. He did not choose to hurt me, I felt hurt all by myself because of my own personality issues and attachments. I think that I’m quoting Karl R who said in another thread that if you want to avoid pain, it’s best to stay OUT of relationships.

84. Jane 84

    What troubles me is the insistence I feel from both you, Karl, and you, Evan, that I am advocating that women pressure men to do anything.  So often Evan, you yourself have complained that people put words in your mouth, I I believe you are doing the same to me.

    If I want a job at a company, and health insurance is a priority for me, but the company currently doesn’t provide it, am I pressuring the company to suddenly purchase health insurance if I decide to not take their offer, and look elsewhere?  If I want to go to the movies, and so does a friend of mine, but it turns out we want to see different movies, and we can’t compromise, so we end up not going together, have I forced her to not go to the movies?  We both have the same choices: either person will see what the other wants, or both see something entirely different.  But if my heart is set on one particular movie, then it’d be best to just go find someone else who also wants to see it.

    In fact, this is a good example, because the movie will be in theatres a limited time. So a person, say, could go see it by herself.  But if she really wants to see it with another human being, then she will avidly look for someone to see it with her.  If it turns out she doesn’t, then she’s back to square one anyway: watching it by herself or with someone else, but on tv – no harm, no foul.  But maybe that very week she finds someone who hasn’t seen it, or who has seen it several times, but loves it so much s/he’ll see it again.  She would have lost out on that particular experience had she just assumed she couldn’t find someone.

    The childbearing issue is the same, in this respect.  If, at whatever point she determines, the woman thinks a decision needs to be made, and he is not ready, then they can part ways amicably, and she can look for another man.  That’s it.  “Funny how people arrive at mutually agreeable conclusions when they love each other, communicate well, and take their time to figure things out as a couple.”  I completely agree with this.  What I don’t agree with is the specific, and narrow, time frame that’s being allotted here.  That can happen in a decade, and it can happen in a day.

    Karl R – If you’re hunting for a smaller pool of men, it usually takes longer to find someone.

    Despite the myriad ways in which this has been articulated, and the numerous people who have, I’ve yet to disagree with either of those two points.  This seems to be where the sticking points are:

    * When one is older and/or one knows him/herself better, the time you need to deliberate a potential match generally shrinks.  Because of that, a more truncated time, in lieu of what you want, doesn’t seem like madness.

    * Probability doesn’t equal absolution.  Give the woman her odds, and let her determine what is best for her, not try to dissuade her from it, because the chances are low, if it is what she wants.

    * Do not let a man determine your schedule.  Do not try to determine his.  Just keep looking until you find one who mutually feels the way you do.

    And all those can be boiled down to this:  if a woman still has the chance to procreate, and she weighs the pros and the cons, and still wants to try to find a man who would want a baby with her, go for it!

    But thank you for the clarification, Evan, on Michelle’s story.  I’ll drop it from my example here.  I hope you had a great time!

    To finish up…

    Karl R – Fiona believes the risk associated with waiting is worse than the risk associated with taking the gamble. That’s likely true for her. It’s not necessarily true for the men she’s meeting. Of course, some men are more willing to gamble than others … but gamblers and risk takers might not be ideal husband/father material.

    I hope you’re not equating all risk, and at that, all risk akin to gambling, or gambling addiction.  Not all risk is the same, you have to take in a variety of factors, along with people’s temperaments.  There is a big difference in taking a chance on love, and taking a chance at a slot machine.    And gamblers, when they get in trouble, are usually chasing the gambling high.  Being too cautious is not good either; you need balance.

    Karl R – This timeline is set by body chemistry. It doesn’t speed up for couples facing imminent infertility.
    We just have different premises here:  simply put, many can override a dopamine rush.   No one can override post-menopause.

    Like I said above, we have premise differences, and once you argue down to the differing premises, there isn’t anywhere else to go, unless one changes.  So I’m glad to agree to disagree.  Thanks for the specifics of your responses.

    @Helen – I liked the way you bridged the varying gaps, and tied everything together nicely.

85. Fiona 85

    Best of luck to Michelle and Mark. Everyone needs to do what is right for them in the  end. Different people have different priorities. 

    However, if Evan is correct about 3 years being needed, all I can say is that it makes very depressing reading for those of us in our late 30s that still want children because it seems that the only choice we really have unless we are extremely lucky to meet a man with a lot of dating experience or to be fertile in our 40s (which is by no means guaranteed) is to either find a partner or to have children but not both. Neither option is very palatable but personally the thought of not having children is not something I can bear.

     

86. Mia 86

    Forgive me if I’m being really ignorant here, but what is this fixation on HAVING to have biological children? If you are reaching the end of childbearing years and are under pressure, why not adopt? Do you know how many kids in Africa, China, India, or even the US are in need of a good home? Adopting them instead of having your own kids is far more of a service to the world, you can have the kid without a pressured timeline, and date in a more relaxed way into your late 30s. I am extremely mixed on having biological kids bc it puts me on a timeline I’m not entirely comfortable with, but this is another option I would be open to.

87. Soul 87

    The body of literate on this question is huge, and many variables have been tested. In fact, the divorce rate has decreased compared to the 60s, and researchers are trying to explain why.
    For instance, after a 3-minute research on google scholar, I found this peer-reviewed paper : “Determinants of Divorce over the Marital Life Course Author(s): Scott J. South and Glenna Spitze, Source: American Sociological Review, Vol. 51, No. 4 (Aug., 1986), pp. 583-590. I can’t manage to upload  it but have a look for yourself…. and that was published in 1986…. You have plenty of other and more recent papers but I do not have time. To keep on looking, you can either start from theses authors’ own most recent papers, or have a look at their bibliography and do a (google scholar) search on the authors cited.   Actually, the divorce rate has decreased compared to the 60s, and researchers are trying to explain this trend.

    PS: I just want to show that the problem is far more complex than “waiting 3 years instead of 18 months before getting married”.  However, I agree with Evan’s suggestion that integrity etc. are more important than chemistry if you want to predict the longevity of a marriage. 

88. Soul 88

    body of literature.

    Sorry for the numerous typos in my different posts, my computer automatically corrects my mistakes but, as for the smart-phones, the changes are sometimes extremely weird, I should double-check before posting, sorry.
     

89. Fiona 89

    Mia@86 People are different and for some that may be an option. Others (like me) feel a very strong need to play their part in the circle of life to feel that they have fulfilled their purpose as female creatures on this planet. 

90. Fusee 90

    @Jane #84: I agree with you about how valid it is to consider the timeline towards marriage and children as a potential “must-have” and therefore deal-breaker if no compromize can be reached. Just as any other item that would be of importance to either or both parties.
     
    Anything can be elected as a “must-have” in a relationship. Of course the more “must-have’s” you think you need, the more difficult it’s going to be to find a compatible partner since you’re shrinking your dating pool further with each additional “must-have”.
     
    To increase chances, it’s most effective to restrict yourself to a very limited number of “must-have’s”. However if time is your main concern for whatever reason, then having the timeline towards marriage as #1 “must-have” is reasonnable. But you need to be aware of the dangers of choosing too fast, especially if you intend to bring children into your decision. If you are on the fast-track lane, you absolutely need all the other safety measures in place, such as experience, self-knowledge, excellent observation skills, good relationship management skills, and a mutual desire to explore in depth characters and compatibilities early on. You will not have much time for mini-golf outings and exotic vacations (they also increase chemistry so they should be avoided on the fast-track lane), unless you take your lists of questions and keen observation skills along.
     
    The happier you are in singlehood and the more time you give yourself to find your life partner, the more “must-have’s” you can afford to keep and the more relaxed your dating life will be… I found that it sure is a better place to find oneself into!
     
     

91. Evan Marc Katz 91

    You make it sound like an either/or, Fiona. It’s not. My wife had Baby 1 at age 40. baby 2 will come before she turns 43. My best friend’s wife had her first at 41. I don’t think it’s ideal, but it’s certainly possible. If you think that getting sperm and raising your kid yourself without a father is a better course of action, I wish you the best of luck. I would sooner choose a good man who is serious about you and try to have kids together (and later adopt) OR choose a man who HAS kids, than to go at this whole mommy business alone. But that’s just based on my experience as a coach. Do what you have to do.

92. Mia 92

    Fiona, I  know your opinion is shared by many women, but I’ve always found it to be rather self-indulgent to insist that we bring in more kids to an overpopulated planet while there are starving orphans who would make great children and, again, aren’t dependent on a woman’s biological clock. I have a 27yo friend who is positive she wants children, but has put no effort into dating for the last two years of being single and won’t even try online. Yet any woman who really wants kids should be putting massive effort in from age 25. if you’re still single by  the late 30s, you have to ask yourself the likelihood that you will find a guy at the low point of your attractiveness to men, in time to have the child. If you have the biological child on your own, you’re now even less attractive to men and will have a harder time meeting them as a single mom. Or you could wait for a guy and adopt. You are in a very tough position that may require more flexibility to find what you want. So do what you feel is best while understanding none of your options are perfect. 

93. Fiona 93

    Evan, that is great news and I wish you all well too. 

94. Tom 94

    Mia, I think your post #92 was very harsh on Fiona; it’s a perfectly normal and reasonable desire to want to have children and no-one should feel guilty about wanting to do so. It’s also very hard for us in our 20’s to appreciate being in that situation, so we really shouldn’t pass judgement.

    For what it’s worth Fiona, I think having a child with your friend is actually a logical and reasonable idea; it might reduce your anxiety and you would still have decades to meet someone. Two of my cousins were single mothers for several years and now they are both married (although not to the fathers of their children).  In this day and age there is no one solution for everyone and no stigma so considering all possibilities makes sense.
    Fusee
    I read in one of your earlier posts that you can ascertain a man’s attitude to marriage and his future within a few weeks of dating. I’m just curious to know how you do this, without coming across as pressuring etc.? 

95. Karl R 95

    Fusee said: (#83)
    “Rather than saying that one year is enough, or that we absolutely need three years to make a wise decision, we could focus on what we do with our courtship time, and what our specific relationship needs before moving to the next level.”

    That’s covered by the last 6 1/2 years of Evan’s blog posts. And my posts are long enough without me summarzing everything I’ve previously said in every new post.

    Fusee said: (#83)
    “But making the passing of time the ‘be all and end all’ of courtship is equally dangerous, as it encourages people to just ‘go with the flow’ for three years while not necessarily working on their character and exploring their future goals and compatibility.”

    Neither Evan nor I have ever claimed that time is the “be all and end all of courtship”. A lot of people are willing to be in a long-term relationship for years, even when they know that they’ll never get married to their partner.

    By the second week of my relationship, I started spending the majority of my nights with my girlfriend. We went through a high-stress situation together during our first year. (You can’t exactly plan for those, but they do allow you to evaluate compatibility like nothing else.) We discussed goals … all those things you recommend.

    Two years of living together (and even solving crises together) wasn’t enough time for me to be certain that we were compatible. It was getting close.

    Fusee asked: (#83)
    “If both parties feel the need for three years, great. How about they make their preliminary goal to have a pre-decision made at the 18-month mark, and then take an additional year to confirm it?”

    How would you initiate that discussion?

    Let me rephrase that. How would you initiate that discussion without sounding like you’re trying to pressure the guy … and without sounding like you’re desperate to get married?

    I would say that discussion is pointless, becuse any marriage-minded man in his 30s (or older) will be giving you clear signals long before the 18 month mark.

    My recommendation is to (mentally) take stock of the relationship every 3 months. By 3 months (if not a bit before) he should be acting like an exclusive boyfriend. Every 3 months after that, there should be noticeable progress forward in the relationship. (There may be daily or weekly fluctuations, but 3 months allows you to see an overall trend.) If the relationship has plateaued for three months, it’s time to discuss the situation (and be prepared to move on to someone else).

    My fiancée and I didn’t have a “preliminary goal” for expressing a “pre-decision” by a certain date. But around the 9 month mark, we agreed that it was likely we would end up married, even though it was far too soon to be sure.

    Jane said: (#84)
    “* When one is older and/or one knows him/herself better, the time you need to deliberate a potential match generally shrinks.  Because of that, a more truncated time, in lieu of what you want, doesn’t seem like madness.“

    Evan’s in his 30s. I’m in my 40s. Readers have referred to us as examples of “self-aware” men.

    Maybe some men in their 50s, 60s and 70s will tell you that you will be fine getting married after 12 or 18 months. I’m not sure how much “older” you’re referring to. But the two of us are saying that two years is risky.

    Jane said: (#84)
    “* Probability doesn’t equal absolution.  Give the woman her odds,“

    We’re not bookies. It’s a big enough risk that I’d advise my best friend against it.

    Jane said: (#84)
    “many can override a dopamine rush.”

    Really? How?

    That sounds like magical thinking. It’s like claiming you can override the impaired judgment that comes with drunkeness. I know some people who believe they can do it. I don’t know anyone who actually can.

    Jane said: (#84)
    “No one can override post-menopause.”

    I have two adopted siblings and two adopted nieces. I suppose your options depend on how badly you want children.

    Jane said: (#84)
    “Not all risk is the same, you have to take in a variety of factors, along with people’s temperaments.  There is a big difference in taking a chance on love, and taking a chance at a slot machine.”

    It’s called a risk/benefit analysis. If you spend more time evaluating how you and your partner get along, you can better judge the benefit of being with your partner, as well as the risk.

    Soul said: (#87)
    “You have plenty of other and more recent papers but I do not have time.”
    
    When you find the time, let us know what you discover.

    Fiona said: (#90)
    “If you are on the fast-track lane, you absolutely need all the other safety measures in place, such as experience, self-knowledge, excellent observation skills, good relationship management skills, and a mutual desire to explore in depth characters and compatibilities early on.”

    So you absolutely need self-knowledge. I know several people who clearly lack self-knowledge. None of them have enough self-knowledge to be aware of this flaw.

    The same applies to observation skills. The people who are oblivious just aren’t aware of that flaw.

    As an educated guess, I’d say it’s not enough for just one person to have those traits. Both members of the couple would need them.

    Fiona said: (#90)
    “Of course the more ‘must-have’s’ you think you need, the more difficult it’s going to be to find a compatible partner since you’re shrinking your dating pool further with each additional ‘must-have’.”

    You just listed five additional traits that your partner will “absolutely need” to have if you want to be “on the fast track lane”.

    See the problem?

    Fiona said: (#90)
    “You will not have much time for mini-golf outings and exotic vacations (they also increase chemistry so they should be avoided on the fast-track lane), unless you take your lists of questions and keen observation skills along.”

    How is that plan working out for you?

    In general, men marry the women whom they have dated. In general, men date the women whose company they enjoy. And in general, men don’t enjoy being interviewed, interrogated or answereing lists of questions.

    Of course, that’s just my experience, self-knowledge and observation talking.

96. Fiona 96

    Mia, I respect your opinion about having children. However,  I am not personally responsible for the overpopulation of the planet or lack of contraception and nutrition in other parts of the world and I come from a country where the birth rate is falling so I do not feel guilty or self-indulgent about having a natural biological desire to procreate.

    Nor am I unattractive to men or not making enough effort. I had serious relationships that failed at 27, 29, 30 and 35. Anyway you are right that I am where I am and there are no easy answers.
     

97. Helen 97

    Jane: Thanks. I try.

    Re: the discussion between Mia, Fiona, and Tom: I think we need to make a clear distinction (because it does exist in real life) between those who want to have children and those who want to have their own biological children.  There is some overlap between these two groups, but some people only want to have biological children and are not interested in adopting, and some only want to adopt and do not want to give birth to their own children. (Who can blame them, right? Pregnancy and labor can be tiresome to say the least.)

    Like Tom, I don’t think it’s our place to judge people for their preferences for biological vs. adopted children vs. no children at all. As long as they’re not hurting others by their preferences, it’s none of our business.

98. Mia 98

    Tom and Fiona, I didn’t mean to be harsh, more was trying to convey that there are no ideal options in this situation and maybe more flexibility is needed. Definitely, if you know you want biological children, have them, but the timing seems tricky.

99. Fusee 99

    In relation to Fiona #85 and Tom #94:
     
    I find indeed unfair to advice someone against following their dream, especially when the dream is achievable, and especially when the advice comes from people not at all in the same situation. If we do not want children (or can easily imagine ourselves without) we are not going to be the best judge of what Fiona should do. And although Evan experienced similar anxieties, it was a very different situation since he was in control of the timeline and had alternative options to have biological children. His wife is probably naturally cool, but given the fact that his strong desire for marriage and children was very clear to her, she could certainly afford sitting back and letting him figure everything out. She knew he was serious and that there was no no advantage for him in letting time fly by.
     
    From what I understood from Fiona’s comments (Fiona, correct me if I got it wrong), I have the impression that her order of preference for possible outcomes would be:
    1st choice: marriage and biological child with her husband
    2nd choice: biological child by herself with donor sperm
    3rd choice: marriage without any child
    4th choice: no marriage, no child
     
    The husband part if out of her control, but not the child part. And given the fact that she stated: “if I am going to be left, I would rather take the risk of being left holding the baby than left grieving the loss of being able to have babies”, it seems unreasonnable to me to tell her to focus on finding a man and allow him three years before deciding for marriage. Her risk of ending up with her 3rd or 4th choice would skyrocket. She obviously prioritizes having a biological child, so supporting her in fulfilling her 2nd choice seems more reasonnable to me.

    
    We can criticize her desires as much as we want, but Fiona simply wants what most women have always wanted. The bad news is that her first choice is hard to get by, especially in the late thirties, but the good news is that nowadays she can bypass the husband step and still have her 2nd choice. A acquaintance of mine, not even 30, is about to give birth to her baby boy that she concieved with donor sperm. She decided she wanted to be a mom and went for it courageously. She is gay and probably would have anyway elected to use that route had she waited for a partner, but she did not wait (or even looked for one) because being a mom was more important to her, and she was ready. Although I do not have the same desires, I find her choice valid, especially since she has carefully considered all implications and that she is focused on her future child’s well-being. She has built a strong, diverse, and supportive community to help her during pregancy and the first few weeks of motherhood. I’m part of it.
     
    @Tom #94: “ascertain” is a bit of a strong word. How can we truly ascertain anything?
     
    The way I proceed is simply ask what their relationship intentions are as soon as they start becoming physical (when they start trying to hold me for example). I listen to what they say and from there, decide whether or not it’s worth explaining my goals. If they look at me blankly, it’s not : ) If we both admit that we are interested in developing something serious IF things work out (of course, at that point we do not know each other well enough, we’re simply talking about goals), I keep dating them with not much physical involvement (nothing beyond kissing and hand holding) until it’s more comfortable to ask more directly what their longer-term goals are and how they plan on getting there (six to eight weeks, depending on how the relationship naturally evolves, how many dates we have each week, how horny we are, etc). By the time I have sex, it is not only exclusive and pretty serious, but I also know that the guy is looking for a wife. We still have to build the relationship and evaluate compatibility, so we might never actually marry (and it’s okay, no desperation here : ), but at least I’m not involving myself with a not marriage-minded man.
     
    Of course I can be misled and sometimes we think we want something and end up changing our minds, but the combination of delaying sex + discussing goals + asking some though/deep questions really offers a good way to discover the man’s relationship goals, maturity/readiness level and encourage him to “disappear” if it’s getting too serious for him. I want him to disappear quickly if he does not have the same goals. Obviously any non-committal or simply confused person would not enjoy postponing sex and having all these conversations. Only serious folks will tolerate them and find them even useful.
     
    Basically, it’s about asking for what you want to know. Asking is not pressuring. If he feels pressure where there is no pressure, it’s his problem, not mine. I stopped worrying about “coming across as pressuing” since I do not pressure people. If a guy asks me for sex, is it pressure? No, he’s just asking, isn’t he? Pressuring is trying to extract something from someone against their best interest. I will never try to extract marriage from a man. I want the man happy as much as I want to be happy. If he wants to explore how great a wife I could be and if he wants to show me how great a husband he could be, good for us. If not, next!
     
    Makes sense?
     

100. Clare 100

     Fusee @ 99

     I think your way of proceeding (as described in your 5th and 6th paragraphs) is pure genius!  

101. Fiona 101

     Karl – it seems that you got Fusee’s comments and mixed up with mine but not to worry. I do not agree with you that in general men marry the women they have dated – they don’t. They marry one of many women they date. If you want to advise your friends not to marry a woman in my situation, I can’t stop you. That is your prerogative. I wouldn’t advise anyone in my situation to wait 3 years so does he gain? Most women in the two generations above did not have to wait around for 3 years for a man to marry them and plenty of those marriages worked out just fine. There are also plenty of marriages that end even though people dated for several years first. Unless you have a crystal ball, you cannot know what will happen. Marriage does not come with a guarantee no matter how long you postpone it.

102. Catherine 102

     Whether or not a woman wants children she needs to avoid wasting an excessive amount of time on men who are not in the zone to commit to anyone. If a guy doesn’t know whether he wants to commit after a year, will he ever?

     Every day we grow older and less attractive and let us face it ladies, men are visual. You can’t afford to waste your youth and beauty waiting around for some bozo who may never get his shit together, to get it together.

     To be fair to some men, some actually say there are not in the zone for anything serious, but we stupidly hope they will change their minds, when they will not.

     The warned us, so we persist in chasing/witing for them them at our peril.

     Ladies once you hit your 40s you are stuffed, as very few men in the 40s will  date women their age, if they can get a woman 15 years younger they will
     go for her. Let us face it, the younger women are generally thinner, and youth is beauty.

103. Fusee 103

     @Karl #95:
      
     “I would say that discussion is pointless, becuse any marriage-minded man in his 30s (or older) will be giving you clear signals long before the 18 month mark.”

     
     Totally agree. It’s been my experience indeed. For some reason I tend to attract marriage-minded people, and they do tend to give those signals early on, even if they would make terrible husbands or would be totally incompatible to me. My problem has never been to attract them (my problem lies elsewhere : ), but I empathize with women who have that problem and/or who get stuck with LTR-minded men in relationships that do not actively progress towards marriage/children. That’s why I cringe at the advice of “giving him three years” with no additional suggestion to monitor what’s going on in their minds. Here I’ve been suggesting ways to clear up some uncertainty and encourage progress when things get stuck. A discussion might be pointless. Maybe not so pointless. Some men are less expressive or simply less self-aware than others. You – Karl – and of course Evan are the exception to the rule. Your marriage-minded mindset, acute self-awareness, analytical spirit, and understanding of women make you different. You may wonder what women’s fuss is all about. Well, it’s because most men are NOT like you, even if they are not bad either of course. You have not had relationships with them, we did! With someone less expressive, less self-aware, less analytical/logical, and less empathetic, we women need other ways to find out what he wants and when he is going to want it when time is scarce. Some women resort to game-playing or ultimatums. Now that is pointless. I choose to have slightly uncomfortable curiosity-based discussions in between wonderful dates where he feels great. To each their own. For me it’s been working great to eliminate non-compatible prospects early on and deepen a bond with the right one without having to wait for years, but I’m aware that it’s not for everyone. You need to be willing – like me – to be “less effective”, and to let a lot of men go, even “good ones”. For me it’s the way to go because I do not have the energy to date many people, I’m in a place in life where being in a temporary relationship is uncomfortable (more than being single), and therefore prefer to invest my energy in a very limited pool of more promising prospects. I have all the time in the world to be married, but once I’m involved with someone, I do not want to be in limbo for too long. I will change my strategy in my 40s if still single at that time, because my life situation will be completely different. 
      
     “My recommendation is to (mentally) take stock of the relationship every 3 months…”
      
     Amen! Your recommendation is what I mean by people “needing more relationship advice”. I have not read the whole blog as I’m still pretty new and limit my screen time as much as possible (although this blog is pretty addictive : ). Giving more time is wise, of course. Giving three years to a relationship without carefully monitoring progress is foolish. Therefore if we advice people to take more time, let’s remind them to ALSO monitor progress during that time and utilize it to investigate what has to be investigated. Of course, you did just that. Of course I do that too. But most people do not manage their relationship. Like any project, it needs careful management, together with one’s partner. Instead, people just go with the flow and slip into a comfortable routine. Yes, people need to be told EVERYTHING. People tend to like receiving a rule and following it blindly, hoping it will be The Solution To All Problems.
      
     “You just listed five additional traits that your partner will “absolutely need” to have if you want to be “on the fast track lane”.
     See the problem?”
      
     I now do, thank you for pointing out my illogical train of thoughts!
      
     Time to stop my long ramblings for now : )

104. Karl R 104

     Fusee said: (#103)
     “You may wonder what women’s fuss is all about. Well, it’s because most men are NOT like you,”

     Most women are not like us either. A lot of women have the exact same traits that women complain about in men.

     Fusee said: (#103)
     “once I’m involved with someone, I do not want to be in limbo for too long.”

     Nobody enjoys being in limbo, but it’s an unavoidable part of dating. During the first 2 months (or so) of my relationship with my fiancée, I was getting some seriously mixed signals from her. (I later found out that was because she wasn’t sure that she wanted to pursue a long-term relationship with me.)

     While I dislike being in limbo, I’d gotten rather accustomed to it. Two months feels like a long time, but it’s not that long in the development of a serious relationship.

     Fusee said: (#103)
     “Instead, people just go with the flow and slip into a comfortable routine.”

     There’s a difference between patience and paralysis. Patience is necessary. But if the relationship plateaus for to long, then it’s time to move on.

105. Jane 105

     @ Fusee:  Regarding your comments in both posts #90 and #99, I agreed with, much, if not most of it!  I would only tweak your specific dating behavior a bit for myself, but generally I really  liked what you laid out there as well.

     @ Fiona: “If you want to advise…Marriage does not come with a guarantee no matter how long you postpone it.”

     I didn’t quote the whole thing, but I definitely agreed with it.  Also, was Fusee right that that is the list of priorities for you?  If so, there is another option.  You can get your eggs pulled and frozen for when the time comes.  It’s in vitro, with the sperm donor being your husband, and the egg donor being your younger self, courtesy of the storage facility.  Much like the other options, it’s complicated w/ no guarantee, but unfortunately, that’s the case for quite a few of these choices.  At least then, if you wanted to take the advice of the majority you could, find your husband, and once in vitro happens, it goes right into your uterus, and you carry it to term, even after menopause.  Just a thought…

     My apologies if this come out brusque…
     @ Karl R…

     Evan’s in his 30s. I’m in my 40s. Readers have referred to us as examples of “self-aware” men.  Maybe some men in their 50s, 60s and 70s will tell you that you will be fine getting married after 12 or 18 months. I’m not sure how much “older” you’re referring to. But the two of us are saying that two years is risky.

     You two are not the only two men in the world, and you two may be self-aware, but you’re flawed, just as I am flawed, just as all humans are flawed.  Do I have to list the litany of examples we all come across in life of men who decided early, and are still together? I don’t think it matters, since I think you will see things the way you want (which is fine; it’s just that the inquiry seems false), but I don’t have a specific age.  I’m not trying to make mandates on human nature when we all grow differently.  Some self-aware men will know very young, mid-20′s.  Some Mid-50′s I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.  It depends on the individual man. 
     You don’t think so, ok.  And I don’t feel like bogging the thread down with various examples, which you may just counter with your own.  I can, off the cuff, say one, since I know him intimately.  He was in his late 20′s, knew within weeks he wanted to marry my friend, less than a yr later engaged, 7 months later married, and 15 years, and children, later, still is married.  But that’s not the only man.  So instead of elusively basing men on you, or Evan, or my friend, let’s just agree that there are a variety of men out there.
     We’re not bookies. It’s a big enough risk that I’d advise my best friend against it.

     It’s not about being bookies, it’s about giving women the information, but not trying to actually think for them. I’m surprised you can’t see the difference there.  So, yes, I may even caution myself that this would be a tougher way to go, but it’s not my choice to tell her to do it, or not.  I don’t know how she feels intimately, although I might have an idea.  I don’t know if letting that desire go to soon will be too much for her, or if she’s fine moving away from it, like the client Michelle was.  You treat your friends how you want, and I will treat my friends how I want.  But for me, I don’t think it’s cool to dissuade a woman from at least trying if that is what she wants, and doing that with probabilities and stats.

     Really? How?  That sounds like magical thinking. It’s like claiming you can override the impaired judgment that comes with drunkeness. I know some people who believe they can do it. I don’t know anyone who actually can.

     Nope.  But I will use your general analogy.  It’s not like claiming you’re not impaired when you are. It is akin to tolerance.  Some people have wicked low tolerance, and just the teeniest bit of alcohol sends them over the edge.  Frankly I wouldn’t believe it, if I didn’t see it myself.  I have a high tolerance, and many people do.  They can consume large quantities of alcohol and function well.  And NO – to head this off, that doesn’t mean under any circumstances you should break the law, like driving a vehicle over the BAC recommended.  But notice they don’t ban all alcohol from your system, so even law enforcement allows for a variance, albeit slight.  People are affected by different kinds of alcohol, and people have varying effects – some mentally fizzle, but their coordination is unaffected.  Others keep their acumen, but stumble worse than a toddler.  And people’s tolerances have changed over time, with weight gain/loss, age, quite a few factors.

     So yes, you can override a dopamine rush.  You’re not in it 24/7.  Different people have different capacities when it comes to the will.  It occurs at varying times, and in varying degrees.  I’ve had relationships where dopamine didn’t kick in until much, MUCH later.  Others, where it kind of came, and went.  It was not this all-encompassing drugged out, nonstop rush.  And I am not the only one who has experienced this.  And again, I’ve read much of the recent news regarding the various neurological findings.  And I value it, but that doesn’t mean it should apply to every single person, at every single time.  But I want to get back to this topic, but at the close, to highlight something else.
     I have two adopted siblings and two adopted nieces. I suppose your options depend on how badly you want children.

     Before I respond, I want to quote what Helen said: “I think we need to make a clear distinction (because it does exist in real life) between those who want to have children and those who want to have their own biological children.”

     I thought I had always made it clear, since the very first time I posted, that I was talking about women who wanted their own biological children.  In fact, this is what I said in my first post (# 53):
     Now if someone doesn’t want kids, or is happy with the differing alternatives from being a step parent, to adopting, to just being a more metaphoric mom to a neighbor or god child, then feel free to ignore everything I just said.
     I have already acknowledged this.  And having adopted children, of any kind, is not overriding menopause.  Even pulling your eggs out and having them artificially inseminated is not overriding menopause.  It is finding alternative methods, because you cannot.

     It’s called a risk/benefit analysis. If you spend more time evaluating how you and your partner get along, you can better judge the benefit of being with your partner, as well as the risk.

     Yeah, I know.  That’s what I was advocating.  But you didn’t call it that in what I quoted – you likened it to gambling, and called the men who’d be interested gamblers, and that I disagreed with.  If you said something like, “in a risk/benefit analysis, this doesn’t seem prudent”, then I would just see we have different degrees of what we consider worth a risk, and I probably wouldn’t have commented.  But since I’m here, yes the more time you spend analyzing, I think is good, because that is how my mind works.  And you can spend great amounts of time assessing the relationship, regardless of the time frame.  Of course, not everyone does, and many people far more intuitive than myself can cite cases, examples, and studies of how you can also over-analyze, over-think, and over-calculate a situation where it would have been far better to go with your gut.  And much the the very recent neuroscience that is coming out is showing how you don’t need one or the other, but a good balance of both – depending on the situation.  And if there is any situation that would warrant that balance, it would be love, and romantic attachment.

     To come back to the other comment.  You know Karl R, when I replied about the dopamine rush, I wondered if I should have elaborated further, and if I didn’t, if you would challenge it.  Eventually, I decided to say it to get my opinion out there in general, but figured I wouldn’t detail it, since that’s partially tangential, and really, I had already committed to some other issues here.  And you challenged it.  I also thought that about my menopause comment.  But I figured that I already acknowledged alternatives in my earlier response, even said to throw out everything I’m saying if that’s the case (which I think is pretty strong), and with the wording, I figured my intent was evident.  And you challenged that. Additionally, I noticed something missing: anything that actually indicated you agreed with me on anything.  No one is 100% right or wrong.

     So this leads me to believe that you actually don’t want to have a discussion, you want to argue, and specifically with me.  Should I just ignore it?  Do you really want me to go into expansive detail, in an already long thread, on everything you disagree with, or don’t see the way I do?  I guess we’ll see where it goes.

106. Fiona 106

     Fusee has my priorities right and thanks Jane for the egg freezing suggestion which is a good idea. I don’t think Evan and Karl are making bad suggestions -I think they are just pointing out that the longer you know someone the easier to be sure you are making the right decision before the decision is made which is logical. Unfortunately though this is not necessarily always practical. Sometimes I wonder in general if our fears of making a wrong decision can lead us to postpone making decisions for longer than we need to rather than just living life and accepting  that most decisions we make turn out to right and those that are wrong are rarely irreversible.

107. Evan Marc Katz 107

     I think that if you actively date online and go out with one man a week for the rest of the year, you’ll find love and won’t have to be so panicked about freezing your eggs.

     You and your husband will figure it out together.

     If you panic about the baby thing, put off dating, remain fearful that a guy won’t commit, give off a vibe of desperation, have your own child, you will find that it’s extremely hard to date as a single mother of a toddler and you might not find love for many, many years to come – and even then, you’ll find a divorced man with his own kids, complications and baggage.

     Date now. If you want a safety policy and money is abundant, freeze your eggs. But it’ll be far easier for a man to commit to you if you know he’s marriage/kid oriented and you GIVE HIM TIME to choose you. Did you read today’s newsletter? If not, you really gotta get on my list.

108. David T 108

     @Fiona 106 
     A long delay to make the exact right decision is often worse than making a potentially wrong decision and then recovering. Fear of making the wrong decision can leave you paralyzed and you go nowhere. Even Evan went into his marriage not 100% confident if it was going to work until they were a year or so into it, but I bet he had confidence in his and his wife’s relationship toolkit and that however the marriage turned out in the end, he would manage.  Make a decision once waiting won’t really give you that much more information on which way to go. . . and be confident in your ability to recover if it is wrong.
      
     Fiona, sounds like you are thinking hard about your alternatives. Comes down to this:  as long as you are confident in your ability to make a go of whatever path you end up on and to be happy in your life, the choice you make now doesn’t matter much. Each direction (have a child solo, or look for love first and diminish the odds) takes your life to a radically different place, but what really matters is your ability to make that place into a home that you are happy living in.
      
      
     @107 Evan, I do agree that dating while married with kids, especially small kids is very challenging, and if you have a kid on your own you are less likely to find an long term loving relationship.
      
     It all comes down to priorities. If having that bio kid is more important to Fiona, she might be willing to sacrifice their odds of a happy/successful LTR. I don’t recall Fiona’s age, but late 20′s to early 30′s rings a bell. If so, I believe she does have some time unless there is some very specific reason to have a child NOW and might as well try your 52 dates prescription.

109. Mia 109

     So go out with one man a week for a year and Fiona will find love, in her late 30s and after probably 20 years of dating and the accompany disappointments? It’s that simple? I have followed this advice since March – after trying it for several months at a time in 2011 and 2010 and having been involved in less formal “dates” with many, many men over the years -  and all I have to show for this latest round is a broken heart from a once a week guy, increased bitterness about being rejected like a stray dog right and left, and lost time that could have been spent doing things I care about, like being with friends, spending time on the water on a nice summer evening, furthering my career. I even consented to my nagging foreign aunt putting me on some foreign match.com-like site where people look for spouses! I made a deal with myself that I would follow this advice for the rest of the year, no matter how badly I wanted to quit, but how do women know it’s really going to work? Are some people meant to not ever be loved? Should some of us just say, I’m clearly seen as a dumb, unlovable barynyard animal by the opposite sex, may as well focus on friends, career and travel? I just don’t get when one should call it quits and stop wasting time on crap that has a 100 percent failure rate.

110. Fiona 110

     I will sign up for the newsletter list then. I did read Why He Disappeared which I found useful in getting closure on a two year relationship that ended with a phone call that I had been torturing myself over for a few years so would be interested to read more.

111. Evan Marc Katz 111

     @Mia – Respectfully, you don’t get it. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.

     YOU seem to think that the alternative to your way of dating is to “call it quits and stop wasting time on crap that has a 100 percent failure rate”.

     Except that dating DOESN’T have a 100 percent failure rate. As we’ve pointed out here many times, over 90% of women get married. I’m guessing that a large part of that 10% doesn’t want to or is gay. Which means that pretty much EVERYBODY who perseveres ends up getting married.

     All this stuff about “some people are meant to never be loved” is just your confusion and pain; it’s not reality. Not for the vast, vast majority of other people.

     Here, Mia, some quick free dating advice. Once I give it to you, I expect you to sign up for my newsletter, purchase my eBook, join me in FOCUS Coaching so you can actually start LIVING this advice instead of complaining that dating sucks.

     -You tried dating regularly for several months at a time in 2010 and 2011? That’s like saying you’re fit because you joined a gym twice for three months each time. I dated regularly for TEN YEARS – stopping when I had girlfriends, of course. The reason I give advice is not so you can take ten years, but rather to save you all the trial and error that I went through. When I tell you something, it’s based on more experience than you could possibly imagine.

     -”Bitterness about being rejected like a stray dog” – Get over it. It’s called dating. If 99% of men are NOT your future husband and you have JUST as much power to say no to a man as he has to say no to you, why the victim mentality? EVERYONE goes through this process. The difference is that other people don’t question their own self-worth or believe that there are NO good men out there. They just shake it off, realizing that it’s nothing personal, and get back out there for another date the next week.

     -Your aunt put you on a foreign dating site? And it’s not working? Shocking. That’s not being open. That’s being ridiculous.

     -Do YOU think that you’re a dumb, unlovable barnyard animal? Are YOU content giving up on love before you’ve even started living? If not, then get off this “woe is me” stuff. Maybe the reason that you’re struggling to connect with men is that you secretly believe these things – and men can pick up on it. Men and women respond to confidence – not desperation, fear, exasperation, negativity and all the other traits you’re showing here. Doesn’t matter how cute, smart or kind you are. If you hate dating, don’t believe in the goodness of men, and spend months involved with once a week guys (when you can easily dump them to clear your slate), the onus is on YOU for where you’re at.

     Sorry, but it’s true.

     When you’re done coaching with me, you’ll see that in twelve weeks, your city is the same, Match.com is the same and men are the same. The only thing that’ll change is you. If you’re open to it, get started above. If you’re not, I’m not going to spend any more time explaining how easily you can make love happen for you.

112. Karl R 112

     Jane, (#105)
     Your beliefs about dopamine seem to be contradicted by the studies using functional imaging of people’s brains. Can you find any studies or other scientific evidence which supports your beliefs?

     But for the moment, let’s assume that your beliefs are correct, and some people’s judgment is less impaired when under the effects of dopamine, etc.

     If someone has potentially imparied judgment, do you think they are in a good position to judge whether they have impaired judgment?

     To me the statement, “I would be able to tell whether I had impaired judgment,” sounds as self-delustional as, “I would remember if I’d forgotten something,” or “I would know if I was mistaken.”

     I know a few people who are aware that they have poor judgment while drunk. They discovered this by repeatedly making poor decisions while intoxicated. I don’t recommend using this method with infatuation and marriage.

     Let’s make a comparison of two people making a decision.

     Person #1 thinks:
     “I might have impaired judgment right now, so I won’t make any major, life-altering decisions until I’m sure my judgment isn’t affected.”
     Person #2 thinks:
     “Some people have impaired judgment under these circumstances, but I’m sure I don’t. There’s no reason to wait before making a big decision.”

     Which person sounds like they’re exercising better judgment?

     If a person has impaired judgment, they should wait until they’re sure they don’t before making major decisions.
     If a person might have impaired judgment, they should wait until they’re sure they don’t before making major decisions.

     Your belief that a person might not be impaired is irrelevant. In either case, the best decision-making process is to wait until you’re sure you’re not impaired.

     You can wait until the infatuation has worn off, or you can get a functional MRI to measure your level of impairment.

     It takes two to tango.

     The decision to marry takes two people. And if my fiancée decides that she made a bad decision (after the wedding), then my marriage is going to fail. Therefore, I have to be certain that her judgment isn’t impaired either.

     By waiting until we’re past the infatuation stage, I ensure that we’re both capable of making sound decisions.

     Jane said: (#105)
     “So yes, you can override a dopamine rush. [...] Different people have different capacities when it comes to the will.”

     Do you have any scientific evidence that willpower can overcome the impaired judgment caused by dopamine? Do you have any scientific evidence that willpower can overcome the impaired judgment caused by alcohol? Do you have any scientific evidence that willpower can overcome any of the other effects of dopamine or alcohol?

     I haven’t found anything suggesting that willpower can overcome intoxication (of any sort). I did find an article (discussing narcotics) which stated, “In the earliest stages of intoxication the will power is destroyed”. Since the author was the U.S. Commisioner of Narcotics, I’m not sure that was an unbiased, scientific opinion.

     I also ran across a discussion on ScienceForums.net, but I can’t tell whether the participants had any particular expertise in the subject.

     If you believe willpower allows you to overcome the effects of dopamine (or alcohol), you’re back to magical thinking.

     Jane said: (#105)
     “You’re not in it 24/7.”

     I agree, and the science supports you.

     The functional MRIs tested subjects twice. In some experiments the subject looked at a picture of their significant other, then looked at a picture of something else, and the results were compared. In other experiments, the subjects were told to think about their significant other, then they were told to think about something else.

     The dopamine effects occurred when looking at or thinking about the significant other (and presumably related situations). They didn’t occur when the subjects were focused on something else.

     Are you capable of deciding whether to marry someone without thinking about them?
     
     Jane said: (#105)
     “He was in his late 20′s, knew within weeks he wanted to marry my friend, less than a yr later engaged, 7 months later married, and 15 years, and children, later, still is married.”

     If I made my decision whether or not I should marry based on a coin toss, I would have a 50% chance of making the right decision. It’s possible to make the right decision based on a coin toss (even though you and I would recommend against it). It’s also possible to make the right decision while dopamine is impairing your judgment. But is that decision going to be much better than random chance? Is that decision as good as waiting to make the same decision with a clear head?

     Some people have taken a large (and usually unneccessary) risk by making a decision while their judgment is impaired. Some of them have gotten lucky and avoided the negative consequences of that risk. Thinking about all those people might make you feel better about taking a risk, but it doesn’t decrease the risk. Nor does it lessen the negative consequences.

113. Fiona 113

     Karl, your way is clearly working for you so that is great and you should stick with it.I agree that the longer you are with someone, the better you know them.

     However, by waiting for a very long time, a lot of people seem to think that they can eliminate risks that are a natural part of life altogether. They can’t. Every relationship is a gamble. There are people out there who have been dating for 3 years or more who don’t get married out of love but out of habit/fear of getting back on the dating circuit again which is not a good reason but they do.

     I know people who married after 1 year and are happy with 3 kids 11 years on and yesterday I met a couple in their 90s who married after a year during WW2 (when hanging around for years was not viewed as a sensible approach) and are still married 68 years later. I also know people who married quicker than 3 years who are unhappy. They may have got married too soon for them but too soon for one couple isn’t necessarily the same for the next. On the flip side, I know someone who dated for 11 years then married but divorced 4 years later, and someone else who dated for 4 years, has been married for 2 and a half and now thinks she has made a terrible mistake.

     Length of time dating does not mean that things aren’t going to happen further down the line. There used to be a concept of the 7 year itch. From what I have seen, whether a marriage is going to last or not seems to depend more on how committed people are to making it work in spite of their differences (assuming that neither party is abusive or develops an addiction etc), and ability to resist temptation when one party is attracted to someone else.

     I prefer to avoid comparing someone who is still on the edge of an infatuation stage (and some people who get married may not have been in it in the first place) with being drunk or on drugs because, unlike an intoxicated person or someone high on drugs, an infatuated (as opposed to obsessed) person with plenty of dating experience is normally still capable of rational thought and recognising intolerable behaviour. Many of us have walked away from unhealthy situations with people that we were very attracted to because we knew it was trouble.

114. Evan Marc Katz 114

     @Fiona:

     Your examples are useful, but they ignore Karl’s point. Every relationship is a gamble. It’s less of a gamble if you do your due diligence to eliminate as many foreseen risks as possible.

     People who got married after 1 year and are still together are simply LUCKY. The fact that you know a number of couples who did this also makes them LUCKY. Because they didn’t have remotely enough information to know if they were compatible for life. They had their passion, their excitement, and their wishful thinking. If 25% of people who get married after one year stay married, that means that 75% ended up getting divorced. The presence of thousands of instacouples doesn’t mean it’s the wisest plan of attack.

     People who married quicker than 3 years who are unhappy? Of course, you know them. That’s because there are lots of unhappy people out there. People who are fearful, depressed, insecure, mean, unemployed, abusive, clueless, etc. It doesn’t matter if these people marry after one year, two years or five years – whoever ends up with them is going to be miserable. The person is the variable, not the time.

     People who dated for 11 years and got married mistakenly? Yep. Also predictable. Clearly, those people were incompatible and at least one of them DIDN’T want to get married. But out of fear or pressure or sunk costs, they decided to take the plunge, instead of listening to the voice that kept them from tying the knot for 11 years.

     The facts show that the people who are most ripe for divorce are those who a) got married too quickly, b) those who waited a really, really loooong time before getting married, c) those who had a bumpy courtship with multiple breakups. The people who stayed together usually had courtships that lasted, on average, for two years and four months.

     Your anecdotal evidence actually supports my case. It’s not your responsibility to force him to propose in 18 months because you’re afraid that your clock is ticking or that he’ll bail. Your responsibility is to invest your time in an honorable, marriage-oriented man and, knowing this, give him all the time he needs to choose you independently. If, after 3 years or so, he hasn’t proposed, I’d probably recommend walking away. Walk away after a year and you’ll lose all but the most impulsive and weakest minded men.

115. nathan 115

     “The people who stayed together usually had courtships that lasted, on average, for two years and four months.” Right. On average. Which means that if you take a large group of married couples, and add up their collective time together before marriage and divide it by the number of couples, that is what you will get. I have been watching this thread unfold and basically think that the insistence on waiting for a set amount of time is being overly justified. I appreciate the guys comments about not marrying just because your partner wants to have children now, and is worried about loosing her “window of opportunity.” However, I disagree with the insistence that the 2 1/2-3 year wait is ideal. I’m not convinced that everyone experiences the chemical rushes of infatuation the same way, regardless of how many scientific studies are thrown in my face. None of the relationships I have been in were the same in that regard, and frankly as I always say on here, reason and research are good tools, but not the final arbiter of our love lives. Evan’s point about women walking away after a year, though, is a good one. It happens sooner in some cases – this “need” to have everything settled quickly. Some men do the same thing. Quitting a good relationship that isn’t fully clear yet isn’t the same, though, as insisting people wait for X number of year, or that those who don’t are probably in for trouble. Point being that I do think these things take some time. But how much time exactly really depends upon each couple.
     

116. Catherine 116

     Hi Evan

     I agree that marrying after a year is too soon, but I think the guy needs to demonstrate  some degree of seriousness about the relationship at the one year mark 

117. Christine 117

     Well, I actually believe the take away point here is just making sure you’re not making a life-long decision only based on short-term physical attraction.  I’ve learned this lesson the hard way!  (but thankfully woke up in time and didn’t marry any of the guys I had that crazy-making sexual attraction for, or I’d be working on a divorce right about now)

     Mia@109, I really do sympathize and empathize with your frustration, when I keep going through it too.  I’ve even had my own experience with the meddling Asian family!  I just remember that it comes from a good place and they are well-intentioned (if clumsy) in trying to help you find love. 

     It doesn’t have to be an either/or proposition.  You can still do things that interest you, hang out with friends, spend time with family…all while still looking for love.  When I date, I try to balance dating with other activities (i.e. work, road trips with friends, spending time with my adorable baby nephew) to try to keep my sanity.  That way when a certain date doesn’t work out, it won’t devastate me because I still have other things in my life that bring me joy.  I think of it like my job search, where I’ll face a lot of setbacks and disappointments, but only need ONE in the end.  I faced a lot of rejections when I searched for a job, but then ended up with one that is bigger and better than I even dreamed of.  Persevering through disappointment has rewarded me in other areas of life, so I think it will with love as well (only love will give me a much bigger reward).  I’m realistic enough to know that I’m outside most men’s preferences (at least in the online dating world, where the 20-something white women seem to have the most options…most men I’ve seen don’t want a 33 year old Asian woman like myself.  Or, they just want some “exotic” flavor of the month when they do).  While it can get frustrating, that doesn’t bother me to the extent it used to.  I don’t want or need most men, just ONE that is right for me.  I don’t care that I don’t appeal to the majority as long as I eventually find the right one. 

     I’m also trying to learn not to internalize rejections or let them get to me.  All it means is that I’m not a great fit for some man or don’t quite fit into his lifestyle…not necessarily anything about my worth as a person.  Unlike close friends and family who really know me, some man can’t be a totally accurate judge of me after just a few emails or one dinner date…so that makes it easier for me to just shrug those off and move on.

118. Soul 118

     @Nathan # 115

     I wholeheartedly agree with you. An average is just that: an average. As such and by itself, it does not tell much actually. It’s all about nuances, as you pointed

119. Ruby 119

     I’m almost 50, so I’m not sure I’d want to wait 3 years to decide on marriage. Besides, I’ve dated enough so that I don’t think I need to. I can’t imagine finding anything better than what I’ve got, and we’ve been dating less than 6 months. A year and a half would be enough time for me, but we’ll see how things go with my current boyfriend!
      
     If I were 20 years younger, yeah, I might need more time, but as I said earlier, age and experience make a difference.

120. Evan Marc Katz 120

     @Nathan and @Soul – Sorry, guys, but your analysis isn’t hitting it. You’re stuck on the fact that people CAN get lucky in love by getting married during the 18-36 month attraction phase. I’ve already acknowledged that, but it’s dumb luck. As Karl pointed out. Most couples who get married fast fail. Next, you point out that 2 and a half years is average. Therefore, some people get married faster and survive. As I’ve already acknowledged, of course they do. I’m not reducing love to hard and fast rules; I am using science to help people make healthier long-term decisions. Waiting a longer time before tying a lifetime knot is a good guideline for couples. There is very little to be gained by marrying quickly based on “just knowing” and passion and then discovering that you were actually incompatible. If your love is true, you can make it for two years without buying a ring. And that goes for the over-50 set as well, who is just as prone to bad decision making and lust as the younger set. I had a 57 year old client who fell hard for a guy who was married SEVEN times. She slept with him, found out he was still on Match.com after he said he committed to her. Shocker. My mom was a 58 year old widow who married a nice guy after a short courtship. She got divorced two years later. Turns out that nice was his only quality – he had few social skills, poor health, and was in financial disarray. Literally, the ONLY person who NEEDS to consider speeding up the marriage process is the 40-year-old woman – and, if she has a boyfriend who is also serious about children, HE will choose to do the right thing on his OWN terms WITHOUT your pressure.

     I know this because that’s what I did. I was engaged in 16 months, married in 20. And I wasn’t sure I made the RIGHT decision until six months AFTER we were married. That’s the chance you take when you rush things. Thankfully, I had a LOT of experience helping guide me before I tied the knot. Most people don’t.

     So yeah, I’m sticking with my claim that you can wait until you BOTH feel comfortable and you’ve BOTH gotten over the “you just know” giddiness. The exceptions don’t disprove the original guideline.

121. Fiona 121

     Well Evan if you are right I guess I’m never getting married because I want my own biological children more than anything else in this world and I cannot afford to wait 3 years to see if maybe a man will marry me (or not) even assuming I can meet someone in the next few months. Even if the guy decides he wants to marry me when I hit 40 and then I find I can’t have children (which is not unlikely) infertility of one party puts a major amount of stress on a relationship and creates a huge risk of divorce in any event. I do not see either adoption or raising someone else’s children instead as an alternative that I would be happy with as I will always be wondering what it is like to carry and give birth to a child (and you can’t adopt at that age in the UK anyway).

     I guess if men want children and they know they need a long time to get married, they would generally be better off seeking someone younger than 35 and women really do need to go all out to find a partner in their early 30s if they want children.

     I am still hoping that I am going to have a bit of calculated dumb luck though. 

122. Ruby 122

     EMK #120
      
     I get what you’re saying, but a man who has been married 7 times should raise an eyebrow under any circumstances. Guys who sleep with women without taking down their profiles are common at any age. And I don’t know how long your mother’s courtship was, but if it was less than a year, that could pose a problem.
      
     Women definitely face more age pressure than men, whether it’s a ticking biological clock, or a fear of getting too old to attract a man. I also think there’s still a romantic fantasy floating around of the white knight swooping in to “rescue” us with a whirlwind courtship. Some might equate the short time period with a romantic sense of “knowing” that this person is the one. Courtships go through stages, and they happen whether a couple is married or single, but the earlier stages are certainly easier to navigate before marriage.

123. Joe 123

     Those of you who are quoting the 2.5-year average and using it to state that since it’s an average, there are couples who got married in a shorter period of time have you also remember that there are couples who got married in a longer period of time.  That’s why it’s called an average!

     If detailed statistics were available, the more useful stat would be the mode: the most frequent number.  If it takes 50 out of 100 couples 3 years, even though the average is 2.5, that is more useful information than the simple average.

124. Jane 124

     @ Nathan -Right. On average. Which means that if you take a large group of married couples, and add up their collective time together before marriage and divide it by the number of couples, that is what you will get.

     Thank you for your post; I agreed with much of it.  But I especially agreed with the bit I quoted, because I began to l feel as if the very nature of what prob & stats are, and why we use them, were becoming unrecognizable.

     @ Karl R: It takes two to tango.

     It does.  Consider my dance card full.  I can’t even answer your questions, when you aren’t comprehending what I’m saying.  Case in point, I never said you can override actual drunkenness with willpower. What I said was this: how long it takes for someone to get drunk, combined with the specific manifestation of said drunkenness, not to mention its duration, is relative to the person.  There’s no universal standard.  Further, in a similar fashion – as in akin; as in like; not exactly the same thing down to the letter; not identical, but sharing commonalities- the same characteristics can be said for dopamine: the manifestation, duration, and levels vary for individuals. 
     Is their research to show that.  Yes, I could probably even show it in some of the studies you are referencing (I’m interested in the subject; I’ve read much about this).  But I’m not.  I only engage on that level with people I believe are arguing (in the classic sense) with me in good faith. So, if you want to chalk up everything I’ve said to some magical mystery tour of thinking, fine by me! 

     @ Evan: So yeah, I’m sticking with my claim…

     If you believe that strongly in it, I would expect you to.  What I didn’t expect, and what actually saddens me at the moment, was that you would feel the need so strongly that you would throw other couples under the bus.  Why do I say that?  Because of statements like these:

     People who got married after 1 year and are still together are simply LUCKY. The fact that you know a number of couples who did this also makes them LUCKY. Because they didn’t have remotely enough information to know if they were compatible for life.

     You’re stuck on the fact that people CAN get lucky in love by getting married during the 18-36 month attraction phase. I’ve already acknowledged that, but it’s dumb luck.

     I could have used an example of one of numerous couples I read online, but I didn’t think it would hold weight, since I wouldn’t be able to truly say I knew them.  Much Like Michelle’s story, actually; I give it weight based on what you say you know about them, being involved.
     The couple I mentioned would fit in with the examples Fiona gave.  And I know them: know the intimate details of how they came together, what was the process that determined their choice in one another, seen with my own eyes the ups and downs, and struggles of their union, as they lived it year in and year out.  They are not successful because of luck, or dumb luck.  They did not go into the union based on some brainless, dopamine high.

     Yet, you moved from talking about what is likely, to making judgments on vast groups of people, who you don’t know. At all.  You may know plenty couples who fit what you are saying.  But you don’t know them all.  And you didn’t differentiate.  You made a blanket statement that either people subscribe to this specific timeline, or their very successful marriages are just based on dumb luck, without knowing anything about them.  And you didn’t have to do that.  You could have easily just chalked it up to standard deviation, where there are usually outliers, or things/people not in the norm.  But instead, you chose to dismiss these unions.  And although this would be a tiny population size indeed, Karl R is engaged, you’re married for several, with a little one, and one on the way, but the couple I know have been married over 15 years – well past the 3, 5, and 7 years where marriages often implode – and they’ve done it with many children.  And I can’t speak for Fiona’s examples personally, like I can this one.  But I am sure some of hers are also successful, and you can’t just chalk it up to luck.

     But I have been feeling for a while now that this has touched upon something deeper than what is being discussed.  And frankly, if the conversation is going to turn in this direction, never mind.  When I initially posted I thought how tragic would it be for a 44 yr. old to wait 2-3 years on a man who doesn’t marry her, and a couple of months later she enters menopause.  Or a 44 year old woman who wants to marry, who has most of her life, to hear, “Oh well, everyone marries eventually.  Keep at it!”  But I’ll bow out here.  Because really, at the end of the day, I won’t be here, nor will anyone else here.  These are intimate, tough decisions that no matter the myriad of advice either way, she has to reconcile in her own soul; one way or another.

125. SS 125

     Evan, you said… the people who stayed together usually had courtships that lasted, on average, for two years and four months.
     
     Wouldn’t this courtship time include the engagement period? From the way I read this, we’re talking 28 months from the time a couple decides to become exclusive to the wedding date. I think this sounds perfectly reasonable, but I think it’s quite different from the idea that an average man needs three years before he decides he’s ready to marry. It sounds like this average guy probably who has a 28-month courtship proposed around the 16-18 month mark (so a little after a year) and then a wedding took place up to a year later. 
     It seems the contention some of us have with your timeline is not the 2-3 years until marriage part, but the idea that a “reasonable” man needs three years before even deciding that he wants to marry his girlfriend. If we’re talking to women over 30 here, and specifically in their late 30s, I can see why they would balk over that. I balked over that myself when a 38-year-old man said he’d need three years before he was ready for marriage (and I was just 30 then, so nowhere near the end of my biological clock), but I said that was too long for me. Obviously, we broke up and I married a different guy… here it is, FOUR years later and that first man has still not married anyone. I would have been taking a huge risk (and likely a bad one) to stick with that man and subjugating my needs for his “just because.”  That’s why I agreed with Fusee when she said that it really shouldn’t be about his needs or your needs… it should be about two people with similar desires and ideas about how they’d like to move their relationship forward.
     Do I believe that marrying after one year is the best move to make? No… even though it has worked for a good number of people. But do I think it’s out of the ordinary for a late-30s man to propose after a year and maybe marry a year later (which would be a 24-month courtship)? Not really… I think the older people get, the more they know what they want — especially if they’ve been dating a lot — and most are not acting out of mere infatuation. 
     I just want to make sure I understand how we’re measuring the time of courtship, because I think that would make a big difference in interpreting your point of view.
      

126. nathan 126

     Evan, if I get married, I’ll probably be on the slow end when it comes to deciding. I rarely rush into anything because when I decide to commit, I stick with whatever it is with a fierce tenacity. Above, you recommend that a woman walk away if, after the three year mark, she hasn’t been proposed to. I can see myself being that guy, and I can see other good partners being that guy. Which is another reason I question hard and fast timelines because at the end of the day, they’re always going to be about pressuring someone. The woman who wants to move fast is pressured to step back. The man who isn’t ready after 3 years is pressured to move forward.
      
     Here’s the thing. I agree with the guideline. I especially think that getting people to delay marriage until after 18 months together makes total sense. But guidelines are meant to offer guidance, not to be used to browbeat others into acting or believing in certain ways. It’s the insistence that you are right, and the rest of us are wrong that makes so many people bristle on this point. Not the guideline itself, which again, I think is useful as a general point of guidance.
      
     You suggest that your “luck” getting married after 20 months was supported by lots of experience. I’d just say it was time for you and your wife, even though you weren’t sure. The majority of people that comment on this blog are over 30. We aren’t lacking in experience. Although we have varying levels of understanding what makes up a healthy relationship, lack of experience isn’t an issue for most of us. In my view, it’s more about figuring out a way to take guidelines that you and others offer, and use them in our particular situations. Some folks need to be more patient. Others need to be more willing to take a risk.

127. SS 127

     I should have said, “he’d need three years before he was ready to think about marriage, not to be ready for marriage.”
      

128. Evan Marc Katz 128

     I think everyone is taking these guidelines a bit too literally, as if I’ve said it’s impossible to have a happy marriage if you marry before a year and a half. Rather, I said that it was prudent to wait a longer period of time so that you don’t make a huge mistake that will cost you years, dollars and children. I’m assuming no one would try to argue with that point.

     So then it’s just a matter of details. Since science says that blinding attraction can last between a year and a half and three years – and during that phase, you don’t always see your partner clearly – I think we can all agree that it makes sense to, at the very least, wait until the high rush of new love wears off. We still on the same page? Good.

     This is all about risk management; gathering as much information as possible to make a smart long-term decision. If you’re driving 90 on the freeway because you’re in a rush to get to your destination, you’re very likely to miss your exit. This is what I caution women (and men) who think that they must MARRY NOW. You really don’t have to.

     Jane’s point about couples who broke up 15 years later is completely irrelevant to this discussion. If he becomes an alcoholic at year 12 and he never had that tendency before, she has every right to divorce him and she could not possibly have seen that coming during courtship. Such anecdotes are asking for hindsight when it’s impossible. But I can’t tell you how many people have told me that they’ve gotten divorced, and, in looking back, seen character flaws in their partners that they should have acknowledged sooner. But they didn’t. They were caught up. They were in love. They wanted to lock it in. And they were wrong.

     Finally, Jane, NO ONE said that a 44 year old should wait 3 years to get married if she AND he want biological kids. Don’t put words in my mouth. I pointed out that the only exception to the 2+ year guidelines should be women of late childbearing age, but if they’re with men who are serious about being fathers (which they should be), they really don’t have to worry, because HE’s feeling the exact same pressure. I was the one who rushed into marriage. My wife never pressured me. That made my decision a lot easier than if she were giving me ultimatums because of her fear. If HE wants kids, you don’t have to do anything but sit back and let him choose you. He knows what’s at stake.

129. Helen 129

     If I may throw a “radical” idea into this discussion: friendship.
      
     Because I feared the browbeating that nathan 126 so aptly describes in his 2nd paragraph, I hadn’t mentioned that my now-husband proposed after only 5 months of dating. But the important point is that we were friends for half a year before dating.
      
     Now, those of you who are mathematically inclined are probably adding this up and seeing it’s still less than a year of knowing each other before we were engaged. But I truly believe the friendship stage was crucial, and made the dating stage faster, because we knew we liked each other. If there’s something that’s so important in a relationship that never gets talked about enough, it’s that you have to LIKE each other. Not passion, not romance – you have to like each other as human beings and friends. Otherwise, how will you last throughout a marriage?
      
     That’s why I’d go against the advice given to Mia of trying to date someone new every week. Dating is such a narrow and high-pressure way of getting to know someone. Since she’s still young and seems insecure about herself as a romantic partner, I’d advise her to take at least half a year off dating completely. I’d advise her to learn to look at other people as human beings who could be friends. Not as potential romantic partners (the men), and not as potential romantic rivals (the women), but as human beings.  This would enable her to take a step back, relax, and see people as who they are: the whole picture, not just some very pressured, very taxing, very narrow niche of “romantic partner” or “romantic rival.” We’re all much more than that.
      
     The reason I think it takes less time to marriage if you’re friends with someone first is that you wouldn’t be friends with someone if you didn’t like them, and mutual liking is crucial in any long-term relationship. You get to know the other person in a more relaxed setting, and learn if you can tolerate his oddities and he yours. I would advise any opportunities to join activities where the focus is on something else, not dating, so that you can get to know others in a friendly way. That good friend could someday become your beloved spouse.

130. Evan Marc Katz 130

     Agree with you about friendship, Helen. 100%. There’s one thing you’re not factoring in, however. This isn’t how one goes about finding a relationship. There’s nothing proactive about it. You just have to hope to make enough good guy friends who are not instantly attracted to you and keep your fingers crossed that one of them blossoms into your husband. That’s a nice sentiment but a poor strategy. It would be like saying “Take six months off of your job search, don’t do any interviews. Meet a lot of people. One of them might one day become your employer.” Is networking a good idea if you’re unemployed? Yep. But without actually going on an INTERVIEW, it’s hard to get a job.

     So, is dating ideal? Not by a long shot. Most people are slaves to chemistry and don’t think of friendship as the cornerstone of a future. Certainly not on Date 1. But going out with one new guy a week doesn’t prevent any woman from having a social life, meeting men organically and feeling relaxed around men. Dating is a necessary supplement to “real life” so that you have the chance to form a romantic connection.

     Because what’s not acknowledged in your post is that many men don’t WANT to be “friends first”. If he sees you and thinks you’re cute, he’s going to ask for your number. He’s not going to wait. He’s not going to take six months to be friends. He’s going to take you on a date and try to kiss you and see what happens. Again, not ideal. But it’s reality.

     Taking six months off dating just means that there will be six months that she will likely not fall in love.

131. Fusee 131

     @Fiona #121:
      
     It looks like you really know what would make you the happiest, as well as what would be the most devastating for you in the long-term. You are your own expert. I sincerely wish you the best of luck!
      
     I agree with the following commenters, and especially find the following quotations useful to the conversation:
      
     Jane #124:“You made a blanket statement that either people subscribe to this specific timeline, or their very successful marriages are just based on dumb luck, without knowing anything about them.”

     
     It’s dumb luck if your marriage (contracted within ANY timeframe: 6 months, 1 year, 3 years, 7 years, whatever) to someone you did not carefully investigate ends up working fine because it just happens that both parties were actually compatible and (were or became) skilled at relationships without previous confirmation of these facts. Nothing to do with timelines, although obviously the more time you have before signing your marriage papers the more chance you have to learn (by careful investigation or by dumb luck) something about the other party.
      
     However, asserting that you CAN’T know someone in 12-18 months just because you yourself can not, is dismissing all of us who CAN, and who affirm that without being in any haze. My boyfriend and I agree that we indeed know one another really well at the one-year mark, and we both admit that the “high” has loooong been gone (since after six weeks of dating or so). There is much more to discover and learn about one another – for sure! – and that’s what a marriage is all about, but we’ve been resolving issues and digging deeper and deeper into our expectations, flaws, and fears since the two-month mark. Although I concede this was not common to be out of the haze and already deep in the trenches a couple of months into dating, this has been our experience and it is valid. Does it mean we are ready to make a decision? Not quite yet, and serious concerns are being raised, so it is not that likely that we will choose to unite in marriage in the end. But we are talking about it and actively working on it. It’s not taboo, and thankfully we will both know before having invested three years of our lives into this relationship.
     
     
     
     SS #125:“It sounds like this average guy probably who has a 28-month courtship proposed around the 16-18 month mark (so a little after a year) and then a wedding took place up to a year later. It seems the contention some of us have with your timeline is not the 2-3 years until marriage part, but the idea that a “reasonable” man needs three years before even deciding that he wants to marry his girlfriend.”

     
     Exactly. But as someone else noted, this is an average, and even if SS’ timeline does sound good to me, it might not even represent what one single couple of the study has actually done! Anyway I will reaffirm that to my opinion timelines are one of the numerous items to agree on or compromize about. In most cases, the woman will be the fastest to feel ready (for better or worse) but not necessarily. It should not be a gender war but a negociation to have with one’s partner. If simply talking about goals and timelines to reach them is a no-no “because he is feeling pressured”, then I’d argue that there might be other issues to deal with first, such as unhealthy communication and inappropriate power dynamics.
     
     
     nathan #126:“Although we have varying levels of understanding what makes up a healthy relationship, lack of experience isn’t an issue for most of us. In my view, it’s more about figuring out a way to take guidelines that you and others offer, and use them in our particular situations. Some folks need to be more patient. Others need to be more willing to take a risk.”

     
     Exactly. Let’s not compete with numbers to prove our experience. I (thankfully) did not need hundreds of dates to get a clue about relationships. Also our individual personalities are testimonies of our fears and how we compulsively try to alleviate them. There is nothing more fear-triggering than the prospect of marriage. Now that is a serious decision to make. If you do not feel fear at all when considering marriage to someone, you probably are on a “high”. The experience of doubts and fears is a good sign that you are probably well grounded in reality.
      
     From reading comments, it’s pretty clear to me that a diverse range of personalities is represented here:
     1. The risk-adverse, willing to go to great lengths to methodically reduce risks as much as humanely possible.
     2. The one who will test their luck, by taking a deep breath and going for it, while accepting in advance the consequences of a bad decision.
     3. And then the one somewhere in the middle, reducing risk somewhat while thinking that there is no “risk zero” and that entering a marriage will always be a leap of faith. Educated- and knowledge-based faith, but faith neertheless.
      

132. Michelle 132

     “If HE wants kids, you don’t have to do anything but sit back and let him choose you. He knows what’s at stake.”

     I love this, and it applies to situations where having kids is not at stake, just remove the “if HE wants kids”.  Men aren’t stupid.  Actually, I’m often surprised about how intuitive they are.

133. David T 133

     @Fiona 121

     
     It sounds like you are closer to the end of fertility than I thought.  I recommend you harvest and freeze some eggs if you can afford it and keep on dating for at least a little while. Build your social network and friends. Maybe you can find some like minded women who are considering solo parenting. 
      
     Joining a cooperative network of women like that, or even sharing a house with one or more of them would make all aspects of life much easier, swapping child care, covering each other during work emergencies etc. We have something in the United States called co-housing.  Living in something like that even if it is mostly couples would still fill some needs. Any of these scenarios will still be harder and emotionally lonelier than a spouse, but much better than being completely on your own.
      
     I hope you find your love, but if you are wise to be thinking outside the box in case you don’t.  I applaud your courage. Blessings.

134. Fiona 134

     David, that’s really sweet of you.

     Thanks and to Fusee too. Evan seems to be getting a bit of flack on timescales but I essentially agree with what he says in 128 and the last paragraph is a bit more reassuring.

135. nathan 135

     Contrary to what Evan suggests above, I really encourage anyone who is bitter and/or deeply confused about dating to take some time off and reflect on themselves. Continuing to go on dates in a state like that just increases the likelihood of attracting poor long term matches. If you’re screwed up, you’ll probably find someone else who is screwed up. I have done this multiple times, and frankly, I’m a hell of a lot clearer about what I want, and what I don’t need, because of these breaks. I’ve learned plenty from dating a lot, and being in my share of relationships. But the times in between all of that really made all the difference.
      
      

136. Joe 136

     Fiona, it sounds like you’re more interested in having a baby than having a husband.  Why aren’t you considering a sperm bank?

     Or find Evan’s blog post on…what was it, sperm thieves?

137. Joe 137

     Sorry for the 2nd post, but here’s the blog post I was referring to:

     http://www.evanmarckatz.com/blog/invasion-of-the-sperm-snatchers/

138. Fiona 138

     Actually Joe I am interested in both hence the fact I haven’t already robbed the bank but thanks for your helpful suggestion. I am sure all women in their late 30s will really appreciate it.

139. Fiona 139

     I have just read the link to Evan’s article on sperm thieves. I would never do anything like that to anyone.

140. Mia 140

     Helen and Nathan, I do kind of agree with you. Which is why, after moving to a new city 6 months ago, my focus has been on friendships. I “ask out” women and gay men all the time to expand my social circle and two straight  guys I met in real life as a result of that socializing have become close friends that I hang out with constantly. I never approach dating like a job, but simply aim to go out with 3 new men a month. My life is filled with meeting young single people all the time and it’s actually been quite fun.

     Much of the bitterness I voice in comments here is the residue of my years of bad experiences prior to the move, when I did not emphasize friendships as heavily, and it also stems from being burned by someone I met in my new city through a girl friend who, like every guy I’ve known, thought I was attractive and interesting and affectionate, but was not in a place for a relationship. The bitterness is thinking I’m a good catch but never seeing that borne out in the results I’m getting, so simultaneously doubting that.  I finally decided I needed to cut people loose a lot sooner for behavior that doesn’t meet expectations, but even that has caused confusion.

     I went out on a wonderful match date the other week with a man who messaged me over the site to say he had a fun time and ask how my day was going. We exchanged match messages throughout the week but he never mentioned other plans, so I figured he was playing me – he is attractive, confident, and sensitive, and I assumed the worst even though he treated me with nothing but respect on our date. So I messaged him saying I was moving on since he hadn’t asked me out again, and he replied with great disappointment, saying he had had a great time with me but wanted to take it slow bc he had gotten out of a ltr a few months ago. 

141. Christine 141

     I think we’re getting too hung up on the numbers here, like one year, two years, etc.  The main point is just to take time in getting to know someone.  It takes time to figure out who someone really is and I don’t think there’s any way around it.  That Chris Rock joke is true, that when you first date someone, “you’re not meeting them, you’re meeting their representative”!  Everyone always starts off (usually) with politeness on a first date.  It takes time and seeing someone in a variety of situations before you really know who they are.  For instance, seeing someone not only when they’re happy and things are good, but also seeing how they handle adversity and bad days.  I think that’s what the point of this was.   

142. David T 142

     @Mia 140
      
     The story in your third paragraph got me thinking about the dating paces different people naturally gravitate.  When two people with very different paces begin to date, a faster person might conclude the other is completely uninterested before the other person has even had a chance to warm up to the faster person.  The two people could be completely compatible, and never have the chance to find out solely because their natural paces at the very beginning of relationships are too different.
      
     Maybe some faster paced daters can’t slow down and once they become friends they can’t move into a romantic relationship.  If they can’t or won’t change, early dating pacing, which is a tiny tiny fraction of an LTR/marriage, etc. becomes a deal breaker!
      
     Clearly the need for a particular speed for someone to decide whether they are interested becomes yet another limit on the size of the available dating pool. 
     (In Mia’s case, this man is just out of an LTR so maybe he is not in a good place for a relationship anyway.)
      

143. Fiona 143

     Mia I agree with Nathan there there are times when it makes sense to pull out of the dating scene e.g. if you have a broken heart (as you can’t give to anyone else until it heals) or another major trauma in your life. However, if you pull out because you are just tired of dating maybe a week or two on a beach will suffice? The dating scene won’t be any easier if you pull out for months or years and you may regret it if you are still single when you get older.

144. Nicole 144

     @Mia,
     Just a bit of advice…it sounds like you shot yourself in the foot with your need to reject that guy when you thought he had rejected you.  Now maybe he was blowing smoke when he said he was disappointed, and I do think that a guy who is interested should take charge and ask you out again (and I think men who are interested in YOU will do that and won’t leave you hanging b/c a person who is unsure but leaning towards yes will try to get on your calendar again).  But perhaps in the future, just let their actions speak and don’t undermine yourself b/c you want to somehow be in control.

     Second, a lot of your comments refer to your “worth” and the fact that you see ugly and fat “friends” (although I would not seriously say things about that about anyone that was my friend, nor would i want friends who talked like that) are married or always have boyfriends.

     I think it’s been mentioned before…nothing about dating and marriage is a meritocracy, and unless you are a model or actress, while some of those things might get you more winks on Match, they don’t ultimately guarantee that you’ll walk down the aisle sooner or have a good marriage.

     At the end of the day, your ugly “friends” got chosen by people who decided that they did not want to continue their lives without them, and they don’t think that they are “too ugly” to marry and have kids with.  

     When we are in high school or college, perhaps these things give us high status, but as your are learning, in the grand scheme of things, they don’t determine who finds true love, happiness, and long term relationships and marriage.  

     You can be a lot “better” than people in a lot of ways (looks, intelligence, personality) and still not be more successful then they are in life, at work, or in general.  Just be happy about what you are and stop thinking of it as proof that you are entitled to certain things before other people get them.

     I think you’ll be a lot happier if you don’t look at other people and say, “I’m better than her, why am I not married” b/c that’s not how it works.  You might think you are better, but you were not better to the other half of that couple, and you only need to be better/best for the person who ultimately picks you.   And one day you will be…

145. Mia 145

     Nicole, I have always been the cool girl to a fault – never cutting anyone off, being very accepting even if Someone took a long time to call me, maintaining an independent life. It’s never, ever worked in 10 years of dating  and because I never “rejected” anyone first it led me to feel like a reject, because normally I would kept exchanging messages with the match guy until he disappeared. By setting boundaries and cutting him and a similar guy off early on, it was the first time I had ever done so and made me feel far less like a victim. 

146. Fusee 146

     @Mia #145: Congratulations! You just accomplished a big step by stopping dating uncompatible men early on. This is what having boundaries and enforcing them is all about. It’s really hard to change these patterns, and you did it!
      
     Can you already imagine how much energy you are going to save yourself, energy that will be available to explore more promising options?
      
     Note: if they want to “take it slow”, it means that they are not interested and/or not available. Just out of a LTR is not being available, period. You are not practice ground for someone still licking their wounds. Not saying they should rush and fill up your voicemail and email inbox in the first week, but when date #1 was fantastic and they are really available, they do not feel the need “to take it slow”. They want to make plans to see you again ASAP.

147. David T 147

     @Fusee 146 Just out of a LTR is not being available, period.
     I agree with that.
     Note: if they want to “take it slow”, it means that they are not interested and/or not available.
     Fusee, who sets the standard of what “slow” means?  Some people think sex on date 3 is slow.  Some people think sex on date 6 is fast. Different people have different paces.  Considering early dating is a tiny part of the whole arc of an LTR, it behooves people to try and match paces so they determine compatibility instead of weeding out for a reason that is really a non-issue six months later.  Now, ‘slow’ might be a mask or front for unavailability. Slow can also mean this person has healthy personal boundaries, is refusing to be swept away by chemistry and have their gonads make their decisions for them. You can’t know that after one date. Maybe three.  

148. Fusee 148

     @David T #147:
      
     Totally agree with your comment that “slow” could mean different things to different people and how crucial it is for both parties to find a comfortable pace for their budding relationship. It’s not even just about sex, but also about time availability and emotional investment.
      
     What made me react in Mia’s comment #140 is the statement – after ONE date – that they want “to take it slow” while NOT even making another plan to meet up soon. Keeping options open by chit-chatting through IM or texting is not “taking it slow”, it is being uninterested and/or unavailable. Look, I’m “slow” at the beginning of a new relationship, especially on the physical front. However I’m not shying away from scheduling the NEXT date in the following 5-7 days. If you do not even want to MEET, you are not being “slow”, you are being uninterested or unavailable. Keeping in touch with such people is inviting them to not take you seriously.
      
     Let’s be clear, I’m not blaming people to plunge back into the dating pool before being ready for another serious relationship. It’s a way of testing themselves, and it can even be a way to grieve and heal for some. What I’m saying at #146 is that if Mia is looking to build a marriage-bound relationship, it’s more effective for her to avoid people who are testing the waters. No need for a woman who knows what she wants to become practice ground for someone not quite ready for the real deal. That’s why I applaud her accomplishement at letting these men go early instead of sticking to the pattern of being the “cool” girl that wastes her energy on IM and texting with unavailable people.

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