Relationship Advice: Wed or not to wed

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I’m currently engaged and have a date set to get married in a year. We have been fighting more over this last year we’ve been engaged then during our whole relationship.(it doesn’t have to do with the wedding) Since Covid he has been depressed and has completely changed from the person I met years ago when we first started dating. He used to be very out going and willing to go on an adventure. Now he prefers to stay home and watch TV and usually puts up a fight if I ask to do something, especially if it is something with my family. I try my hardest to be there for him, but it’s hard. We seem to have great weeekdays together and once we get to the weekend I feel like I have to walk on egg shells. Like one little thing will upset him and will spiral until a huge fight happens. He says that I am now mean and that I hid my “real self” until we were engaged. Yet he says things like “I don’t know who would want to marry someone like you.”At times I know I can say things that I don’t mean. I’ve been trying to not do that in the last year. I am very close with my parents and try to see them weekly if I can. A few weeks ago we went together and he was completely removed from the group, staying on his phone. He didn’t talk or interact with anyone and only did so when they initiated the conversation. Even then he was very short. My mom and my brother brought up their worries about my fiancé after that incident. (I think they are insinuating if I was okay with being in a relationship with someone who is depressed) Sometimes I wonder if my fiancée really doesn’t want to get married and does this stuff on purpose. (His parents went through a messy divorce when he was younger) He has brought up to me not using the word “forever” in his vows because he’s like that’s unrealistic. He is the breadwinner in our household, which he knew was going to be the case because of the job I have. He continues to bring up how it’s HIS house or he can do this or that because he pays most bills. We have lived together for most of our relationship. Currently, I’m using my paychecks to pay off our wedding so we don’t have any debts from that in the future. It is so confusing because 5 out of 7 days of the week we are stagnant and normal. We get to the weekends and usually, especially when we don’t have plans, a fight will happen that causes us to not speak to each other. As bad as I want this relationship to work because of the love I have for him, I also wonder if it’s hurting me more to stay…

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Type: Discussion • Score: 2 • Views: 1,161 • Replies: 4

@Nicole731,

If it's like this now, it's not going to get any better once there's a ring on your finger—if that ever happens. This guy seems to be quiet breaking up with you, if you will (like quiet firing, but with emotions). Certainly he's creating an escape hatch for himself by avoiding a word like forever. He is warning you. You need to pay attention to these warnings.

I think your family is right to be concerned and they are probably correct about him being depressed (I am not a doctor, and they probably aren't, either. But if it quacks like a duck...).

Have you ever suggested therapy for either his issues or as a couple? If you have and he's launched into how dare you insinuate there's anything wrong with me mode, then he is not going to want to do other things to strengthen your bond/try to keep you together.

He has even withdrawn financially. You make less than him, yet you are footing the entire bill for the wedding if I read you correctly. Weddings these days, with ~ 100 guests in a decent venue with catering are going for ~ $22.5k. This could easily be your net income for a year, or a substantial chunk of it. This will put you in a lousy place financially. Don't get into that bad financial place. It can be hard to recover from it.

Don't beat yourself up about saying anything you didn't mean. That happens with everyone. But his remarks are cutting below the belt. And you are walking on eggshells, doing anything to avoid a fight.

You want to do that for the next however many decades?

PS If his relationship with your parents is like this now, what's it going to be like if either of your folks, God forbid, gets sick? Or they fall on hard times? Will he be willing to pitch in and help, or at least write checks? Or will he just sit there playing on his phone until it all resolves itself somehow without his input?

At the absolute minimum, put off the wedding. Give it, say, 6 months. If things don't improve, and in particular if he refuses any counseling or other attempts to improve the situation, then I think it would be in your best interests to get out before he spirals down any further, and he starts to take you with him.

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If you have to ask, the answer is, "No."

Marriage is not the sort of commitment one should be using a Magic 8 Ball or A2K for. Reread Jespah's advice.

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@bobsal u1553115,

That was pretty much my thought. If you have to ask strangers, you already know the answer.

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@engineer,

And if they don't, they should know the answer.

I get grasping at straws, but reality has to set in at some point.

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Relationship Advice: Wed or not to wed

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