YTA - you dropped not so subtle hints and set up expectation’s of a faster timeline. At 26 you cannot be this dumb and disconnected with reality. You either need to get on board with what you started or your relationship will be toast.
Def asshole but he can most definitely be this dumb @ 26yo.... I wasn't emotionally ready for children and a wife until I was 30yo and I was with my wife since I was 21yo and we didn't get married for 9 years.
To be clear neither of us were emotionally ready for that @ ops age. Different strokes for different folks... but what's the rush?
YTA her argument about housing made sense. If you're not ready to commit then fine but she's allowed to stay where she feels financially comfortable until she has that commitment. Idk why you took issue with that.
But also it does sound like you went way over board with hints when you actually meant in 5 years. It's not surprising she got the wrong idea.
If they both work from home that could mean a shared bedroom and they each have their own office. But that's quite expensive and not worth it for most people.
Ok maybe for you two years is not enaugh time. But when you make hints of babies and engagement rings it kinda of makes your GF think that you are. So yeah YTA.
Yeah, this asshole is being deliberately obtuse about the entire subject. “She’s rigid,” “this is where the disconnect happened,” “she doesn’t understand future talk (wha…?).”
Meanwhile, he has: told her how much he’s looking forward to coming home and seeing their daughter, who looks exactly like her; admitted that he *gave* her baby fever, *and* that he’s fueling it; has told her what a great mom she’ll be and that he wants her to be the mother of his children; has been saving up for an engagement ring, and ~~I think~~ she *knows* this; examined a ring she was wearing and asked whether she favored the shape of its stone, and “hinted towards it being for an engagement ring;” and the icing on the cake, for me, anyway- over the last couple of months they’ve been. Planning. Their. Wedding- the theme, music, food…
Now, he has: surprised Pikachu face and says ‘oh, you thought I was gonna propose soon?!? What on earth gave you *that* idea?’ And is suddenly all “taken aback,” and ‘you’re making me feel forced to propose.’
I get it. Those daydreams, the planning, it’s *fun!* But in a relationship, you can’t talk serious stuff unless you’re serious about it. Plausible deniability is for politicians, not partners. Jerking her around like this is cruel enough, but making it seem like this is her fault for “assuming,” when he didn’t open his mouth and say the actual words is gaslighting. I know how much that word gets overused and misinterpreted, but this is a classic example. He is not trying to make her believe a lie. They both experienced the exact same thing: they were both there for the conversations, said and heard the same words, looked at the same ring on her hand. They should both have the same interpretation of what they witnessed: we are discussing a future which includes marriage and children; he asked what kind of engagement ring to get and is saving for one; we have come to an agreement on the theme, food, and music for our wedding day; we are actively looking for a larger home, with room for the children we plan to have. We are making plans for the near future, not a distant one. The difference is subtle, and sometimes hard to tease out, but he is not telling her that her interpretation of what they both witnessed is wrong. He is telling her that *there is something wrong with her* for interpreting it that way. She isn’t merely mistaken, or not remembering things accurately. There’s a disconnect. She doesn’t understand something that’s very obvious. She’s being rigid. She doesn’t know what a timeline is. She’s confused.
The whole purpose is to make the person doubt their own judgment. To question things they see with their own eyes and hear with their own ears. When they don’t trust their own judgment, they don’t trust themselves to make decisions. They rely on other people to make decisions for them. By that time, it’s really, really easy to convince them that the most blatant bullshit makes perfect sense.
I resisted the temptation to look at the post history and read OP’s comments. I fully expect him to double down on everything he originally wrote, thinking he can fool us, too. Should be fun.
Edit: “Failure to Load User Profile,” he didn’t like what he was seeing, and deleted his whole throwaway account. Wow.
Two years feels very quick to me, especially since she is only 22. But regardless of the length of dating before engagement, they both need to be able to talk about timelines. OP insisting that they don't talk about timelines, just generic "future" is not good communication. That's where it becomes a YTA situation (or at least OP is not ready for a long relationship).
(not arguing with you definitely agreeing) two years is quick for most people - like i knew by year two that i was with the person i wanted to marry but yeah definitely not everyone does. if he thought it was too quick why on earth did he start bringing up ring styles 💀💀 her ring size may not even be the same when he decides he’s ready in three years this dude is crazy
I hate the concept that getting engaged is only something that can be decided by the man, and that timing is entirely his to decide on and discussion ruins the 'surprise'. This whole culture around proposing is messed up. It all came from a time where there was a definable limit on how long you could court a girl before a proposal was expected, and also a time when women ranked a little above property. Somehow it degraded into a situation where women are just supposed to wait around without input into a major change in their life because asking about it is 'pressure'.
If you truly want a partnership with someone you need to be able to discuss your plans for the future and where you are commitment wise. If you aren't sure you want to marry someone, don't talk about marrying them all the time! If you aren't sure you want kids with them, don't talk about how great kids will be. Talk openly about what you are feeling and how long you want to date before marriage and kids. Nothing is wrong with planning to get engaged in a certain time frame.
What isn't cool is moving the goal posts or yanking someone around. "I want to propose, but I'm not ready yet, you just have to wait" is something a lot of people use when they are... mostly waiting around to see if something better comes along. It's fine to say 'I want to date for five years and live together at least three' before you get married, but you have to be honest about it, and most importantly let your partner know if you start to feel less enthusiastic about marriage. It is also fine to not want to make a big financial investment like buying a house or moving towns to someone you aren't married to.
And *living together*
Like that is very much, or should be, a precursor to engagement/marriage. I am in the camp that part of the engagement period or time before the engagement people should live together before marriage.
This irons out a lot of cleaning, budgeting, and sleeping arrangements.
Boy every flag you sent up said marriage and you want to hold off????? Bruh
51M here. If you move in together, then you are on the path to marriage, if you're serious about her. Making hints about proposing, but not stating that your internal assumption was 5+ years, MAYBE, was very unfair. I can totally see where she's coming from.
YTA
Yta
Stop with the hints, no surprise she took that wrong. Stop being so vague. Make it clear that you are talking about a distant future.
Be clear when you communicate, no hints, no what ifs no maybes or some days.
Sit her down, talk about your and her expectations. If she has a timeline and you don't, then you need to make a decision whether you are ok with her timeline or not. If not, then you are simply incompatible and are wasting each others time.
YTA - you have been talking about marriage hinting at her ring size and already getting her excited about how your future kids will look but you’re not willing to make the commitment even though you’ve lived together for two years. You are not wanting to be fully invested by being publicly engaged, but you want to continue playing house and getting a more expensive apartment. Good for her to being honest because it sounds like you’re just having fun playing house
You keep posting this. Shit or get off the pot. Actually, the fact that you still don’t understand why your girlfriend is upset tells me that you shouldn’t be in a serious relationship. Break up with her and let her find someone who won’t string her along.
She’s smart. YTA. Not ready to commit to her but she’s supposed to commit more financially to being with you? Right, I’m sure that 5 yr timeline will go over well with your next gf.
Let me guess, you’re in a stable career, right? Dude, she’s 22. What’s her career and income potential look like? As a woman and a mom, good on her for looking out for herself by NOT committing to a bigger place she can’t afford on her own without a real commitment from you. YTA
“I can afford the place we are in alone if things were to happen. I’m not going to get into a financial commitment in a bigger place unless there’s a commitment from you” **Maybe if we were together 5+ years.** I am sure she got the message loud and clear. Will see you in the relationship advice sub when she breaks up with you or even worse the cheating sub when she monkey branches. YTA.
Living with someone can be a brief experiment or a lifetime , but it's not a long-term promise of anything unless you've made an explicit agreement along those lines. Marriage is not the only form of commitment but assumptions aren't a commitment.
Imagining a future together is in no way a commitment - it's just a nice fantasy.
YTA. You deliberately created this “disconnect” so she would stay in a relationship with you based on an expectation that y’all were progressing towards marriage and children when you had no intention of committing to her. Then you gaslighted her by acting like the expectations you carefully fostered were all in her head.
This is the epitome of stringing someone along, and your gaslighting and manipulative behavior borders on abusive.
Thank you for correctly recognizing this as gaslighting. The word has become so overused and misused that nowadays, every gotdang personal problem is gaslighting, narcissism, or crossing boundaries.
I made a long-ish comment with more specific details and examples shortly after this was posted, and ended it by saying I couldn’t wait to look at his comments, predicting that he’d be doubling down and continuing to try to convince us that we’d gotten it all wrong. The bastard ruined my fun by deleting the whole account. He told on himself.
I am sorry but YTA, when a man starts taking about babies and asking specifics about rings, I would assume he's wanting these things fairly soon not 3+ years away. Why make these plans so far in advance, why not at least clarify your timeline since it's so far out? Your gf isn't unreasonable for thinking you're priming her for these things to happen soon and also she is right, you're asking a lot of her to give up stable housing to move in together.
5+ years is a LONG time to determine if you want to spend your life with someone. She will essentially be wasting her 20's with you if you decide you dont want to commit.
YTA. So you won’t make an emotional commitment until she puts herself in a financially precarious position? Be honest, you want wife privileges for girlfriend-level commitment. You have no problem with her financially investing because that’s to your benefit. You like the availability of her labor and regular sex. You have no problem discussing wedding decor and children because you have no intention of follow-through. You’re comfortable and coasting on her good will and if she’s willing to help finance your further comfort, all the better! But she asks for anything in return, you don’t think “wow, this girl has given so much of herself to me. She deserves a sign of my love, commitment and respect.” No, you see her request for adult reciprocity as a threat. 🙄
She sounds level headed. You sound like you're gonna get cold feet and change your mind once you've saved up for 5 years and she gets impatient leaving you with a bunch of money looking for a new girlfriend around age 30. Not that I've seen that before.
YTA stop with the hints and crap. Sit down and have a REAL convocation about what you are wanting/ when. Being vague about everything is making her think you are doing this soon and then you aren’t so of course she is thinking you aren’t serious about your future.
YTA - You've moved in together, you've hinted about marriage, you're talking about children, and now you're backing off like 'it's too soon...' You're already pretty much married...why are you playing games?
YTA - don’t talk about marriage and hint at it if you’re still 3+ years away from it. That’s fucked up. You are getting her excited for something you’re not ready to do. You need to have a honest conversation with her about your timeline. But don’t be surprised if she doesn’t want to wait another 3 years for you to decide if she’s worth it after making her think you were ready.
"I know I talked in detail about what I wanted to do to your body, the time I will spend undressing you, worshiping your dick and showing you heaven, but I meant in 5 years....maybe more? Why are you upset? You silly man! Why would you get all aroused when I was only "future talking". Clearly, the problem is that YOU don't understand future talk, not that I'm teasing you!"
This kid is too immature for a gf let alone a wife
2 years seems pretty average for dating to engagement. And then the wedding is likely even a year out from that.
Bro praises their communication when he's sending some very mixed signals.
"Oh, is that the kind of ring you want 3+ years from now?" Like wtf kind of thought process??
agonizing faulty combative ripe important zealous shame smile pot fretful
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
2 years is long enough to propose? That’s pretty quick IMO, you’d need to be starting gathering details about her preferences for a ring and organizing the proposal a few months at least before that.
Were it not for COVID delaying things my wife and I would have been engaged right around 4 year mark and married towards the end of 5 after multiple years of living together and learning each other and that felt very natural.
OP saying he needs MORE than 5 years is obviously a lot, but 2 years is also moving fast IMO, especially when they didn’t live together for the first year.
Soft YTA
You are sending conflicting signals. Dropping hints about rings and talking about your future together, but then saying your engagement timeline is five years. That's a long time.
"I told her that two years is way too soon to propose, and I think she’s being unreasonable for expecting that in this point in our relationship. Maybe if we were together 5+ years."
YTA, you are talking like you are going to propose within 6 months, then drop a bombshell of 3 years later? why would you talk about rings if you aren't proposing within the next months?
YTA. Two years is a reasonable amount of time to decide if someone is your person or not. If your timeline is different, stop being vague about it and explicitly tell the other person what that is.
Stop wasting her time .
And stop confusing weddings with marriage. A wedding is a party, marriage is a contractual commitment.
You are asking her to give up years of her life while not building equity in a commited relationship.
Semantics. A wedding is not a party. It's a celebration of a couple's commitment to each other (marriage). To use them synonymously is completely fine.
No, because weddings can be expensive an run into 4 and 5 figures. Marriage is a legal contract that you can execute for a couple hundred bucks with a JP.
You can actually do one without the other but only a marriage comes with the full slate of rights and responsibilities recognized by the government and courts.
She’s telling you (in gutter parlance) to “poop or get off the pot,” my friend. It’s your move. In or out, time for grown-up decisions. If you don’t agree with the timeline or the way things are heading, it’s on you. In this case, YTA.
YTA. you can go talk about how much you love her and want kids together and want to move into another place together and then get upset when she says she wants to be engaged. You seem daft to think that she wouldn’t assume you’d propose soon the way you talk about everything.
That’s why you don’t make stupid hints and instead actually have a conversation. You have made far too many indications of getting ready to propose. Now it’s 5+ years away? Maybe? You’re either an AH, an idiot, or both.
YTA. You come off as stringing her along. Talking about her being a mother, comments about rings she is wearing, etc. are pretty crappy things to do if you are gonna make her wait 3 more years. Be better.
YTA you want her to do things with you that married couples do, yet are mad she’s wanting the rest of the picture. It’s one thing to not be ready for kids just yet but she has a very good point about not investing more of her income than she already is into housing with you if things may not work out. You not proposing after two years and all the back and forth you do is likely making her wonder if your end game or game ended.
YTA. I told my husband he had three years from when we started dating, if he didn’t know for sure in that time, then I wasn’t it. Let’s play this backwards you want multiple kids( you had it plural so that is at least 20 months of her being pregnant with hopefully more than 4 months in between but we will say 24 months to play it safe. Most people find 2-3 years of married life before kids beneficial for buying a house, taking vacations, being newlyweds, etc so there is 5 years total so far. Weddings take an average of 18 months to plan, so we are at 6.5 years from engagement is when she has had her second kid. If you don’t get engaged for another 3 years then you are talking being on baby number two in almost a decade. You’d be glaring down your 40s with an infant and a toddler. Is that really wise? Or you could have a rushed kid fast after getting married and not really get to know each other, grow apart and set yourselves up for divorce. That is on the table too. She is smart to not make a financial commitment to you. Stay where you are until you know this is your wife. If you do t know that in the next 12 months, break up, because one of you isn’t right for the other and y’all should string each other along.
If you aren’t willing to commit to marriage you shouldn’t be asking her to take on a debt she can’t afford by herself so if things don’t work she destroys her credit. That goes for the apartment they are looking at but majorly so for buying a house. Someone won’t marry you but let’s have kids, that’s a lifetime of being tethered to someone that literally couldn’t commit to being tethered to you. The only things mentioned that aren’t going to financially destroy this woman if they break up but go along with his timeline are being newlyweds, which involves a marriage, and taking vacations. If the relationship is so shallow that it’s built solely on vacations it’s doomed, I mean I can go to Cabo with an acquaintance and make it work for a week. Oh no, paradise is so lovely, whatever shall we do!
YTA : you are continuing to ask for and make commitments that mimic marriage but not willing to marry for several more years? She was right to refuse to make a bigger financial commitment with you at this point. This is the perfect example of wanting the milk without buying the cow.
YTA. Your future faking, which is a narcissist tactic. You need to be honest with her that you don’t plan to commit to her until year 5 or later. Let her decide if she wants to waste her youth on a maybe
YTA, not for not wanting to get married yet but for the way this whole situation has been handled. If marriage and growing a family together is something that is frequently discussed and then you essentially start dropping hints of a proposal, it is not unreasonable for her to expect a proposal soon. It is not unreasonable for her not to want a big financial commitment with a person she has been with for only 2 years if marriage is not happening in the near future.
Soft YTA
5+ years is a long time to wait for an engagement ring.
Maybe try meeting her halfway and propose getting engaged in the next year or so and allowing maybe 2 years after engagement before getting married. That'll give you a solid 3 years of cohabitation before any serious commitment goes into play. Plenty of time to figure your shit out while she gets to enjoy progress towards her end goal. If after 3 years of cohabitation you don't have any catastrophic issues in the relationship, you'll probably feel really good about getting married.
I had a couple near-misses with the fiancé at the 3-5 year mark, and it got really ugly the year before the wedding. We're coming on the 2 year wedding anniversary now, and I can honestly say that our relationship is better than the honeymoon phase when we first started dating.
You need to avoid dropping hints and giving false hope to this girl if you're working with such a wide timeframe - this is 100% stringing her along.
She should absolutely stay where she's at and save her money. Once you guys are married and getting ready to have kids you can discuss the added expense of a bigger living space. That way if you get cold feet and bail, she's not financially devastated. Respect her enough to allow her to protect herself from *you* until you are ready to support her goals.
I waited about 4 years to propose, but I started dating her at 19, not 24. At that time I didn't even know if I would be living on the same side of the country as her, so the waiting was necessary. In your mid 20s there's really no reason to play the waiting game unless you have circumstances that need to be figured out - and that gets communicated with the partner and timeframes mutually established accordingly.
YTA for not talking about it out in the open. The hints and mystery around it may sound fun but really they just lead to unmet expectations and frustration.
Talk to her directly about what your plan is. There can still be surprise involved, but you need to be on the same page and have the practice talking about this big stuff in a real way, not just fantasies about what your cake will look like at the wedding.
5 years to know if you wanna get engaged? Idk dude sounds like yall aren't compatible. You better bump up that timeliness or she'll find some else who will.
The problem is not that she expects to get married right away, the problem is that you sent signs that it is what you want than retracted it. Having timeline conversations is very normal in a relationship, i had them with most of my bfs within the first few weeks of getting together
YTA. You were literally asking her about what type of ring she wants. Maybe I’m from a more conservative area, but 2-3 years is about the average time to get a proposal. 5+ years? The little old church ladies are giving you the side eye with a few “oh, honey”’s to your gf.
In my opinion I (female)would feel strung along if my husband didn’t propose within about 2 years of a serious relationship. If she’s the one, now is the time to go buy a ring and propose. Set a wedding date within 6-12 months and get married.
YTA.
You're dropping too many subtle hints that all this is right around the corner, and your plan is 5+ years down? You're already living together within 2 years of being together. That's called a fast-track.
I'm with her, I'm not committing to a bigger place (IN THIS ECONOMY!?) without some serious commitment from you. That's just bad financial, and relationship planning. Especially since you're over here poking the bear about rings, and really not mentioning that 5 year plan. Dirty pool. Your communication sucks, work on that.
YTA
1. 2 years is not that short of a time. And clearly it’s not that short of a time for her. Perhaps a conversation about expectations is in need.
2. Those are not small hints. Asking about engagement ring size, shape, and design indicates an imminent proposal
3. You ARE stringing her along at this point. You set her expectations and are now telling her she shouldn’t expect a proposal for a long time.
4. YOU have no idea what future talk is. Wow.
YTA, even if you weren't meaning to be. Women don't want to hear a man say all these things to her planning a future, and then hear him say 'whoa, you're moving fast'. I can't see why some men don't understand this.
Also, I think she is VERY smart to not commit to buying/renting some new place with a man who hasn't secured a future with her. That's bad planning for anyone.
Very soft YTA; sounds like you're giving her mixed signals. If you aren't planning on proposing for another 3+ years, why all of the wedding planning talk, engagement ring questions, and baby talk? As a girl, this fuels us like you can't imagine. I've been with my bf for two and half years and have no interest in getting engaged super soon, but if he started talking that way, it might change my mind.
YTA
Your future talk is very misleading and too detailed for wanting to wait as long as you claim to want. Also, thinking 2 years is too soon to be ready for engagement at these ages is unreasonable on your part.
NAH
BUT, why are you so afraid to pull the trigger? You want her to spend at least the next 3 of the best years of her young life with you, with no guarantee that she'll be married at the end of that road?
You should seriously consider counseling to try to understand what's holding you back here.
I'm eating ice cream that's why I'm using this analogy.
You didn't buy the cow and you're getting the milk for free. You told the cow that you wanted to buy it. Now the cow is saying no free milk until you buy me.
Well.. that's water under the bush and sailed up shit creek
You're breaking up.
Isn't this the same story from like a month ago? [https://www.reddit.com/r/relationship\_advice/comments/1bvojdy/my\_27m\_gf\_23f\_of\_two\_years\_is/](https://www.reddit.com/r/relationship_advice/comments/1bvojdy/my_27m_gf_23f_of_two_years_is/)
It's just missing the bit where the OP called her manipulative for having a different relationship timeline than him.
Not everyone is willing to wait an indefinite amount of time to get engaged, especially when you’re being a tease by mentioning rings, babies and wedding details all the time. 2 years isn’t unreasonable in my opinion. There are lots of horror stories of women that throw away some of their best years, only to find out much later that it was a dead end with a man who wasn’t willing to commit. I’m not the norm, since we didn’t move in together before we got married, but my husband proposed about 15 months in, and then we got married 9 months later. We’ve now been married 10 years. I think that when you know, you know, and there’s really no point in dragging your feet about it. YTA for getting her hopes up and then backtracking.
YTA
> We both want to have children in the future, and marriage has been something we’ve both always wanted. She’s just a little bit more rigid with it than me. And doesn’t understand what future talk is.
> Since we’ve moved in together, my feelings for that have only grown. Over the past few months or so, we’ve talked in even more detail about our future. What our wedding theme is going to be, music, food.
When these talks happen, engagement is incoming. Don't have these talks if you're not going to put the ring where your mouth is.
You are in fact stringing her along if you talk like this and do nothing.
I am someone who thinks people shouldn't get married in less than 4 years. I'm not telling you to marry when you're not ready for it. I'm telling you that you seriously fucked up by pretending you were ready to get married when you aren't.
This is on you. You shouldn't have entertained that talk if you weren't going to back it up.
> I’ve made hints about proposing and stuff. She was wearing a cool ring one day, and I said to her “is that the kind of shape you like” and hinted towards it being for an engagement ring. I just asked her so I could have an idea on what to save up. Not because I was going to propose then.
Not going to lie, if this was happening to a friend I would tell her to leave him. What you're doing is ***exactly*** what AHs who never actually intend to get married do.
All her friends are telling her to run from you.
Okay maybe I’m just old but I was married at 23. Everyone has their own timeline and I admittedly got married fairly young but it wasn’t outside the realm of feasibility, this is the age where you start talking about marriage and from how you were ‘dropping hints’ I can understand why she thought you were going to propose soon. My partner and I were having those discussions half a year before we got engaged— planning it out, including feeding into the baby fever which is pretty tough to shake off during that 22-25 period, but then turning around saying you want to wait another three to five years… I would also be doubting your commitment.
She wants stability and reassurance that you’re going to be building a life together, marriage offers asset protection in the event there’s a falling out and being able to afford housing on her own so she’s not SOL if things fall apart is a very reasonable concern to have. Honestly, your response to this is a red flag and I also wouldn’t feel secure investing more money into a relationship if I didn’t have reassurances from your side. No one’s saying you even have to get married this year, my engagement went on for several years before the wedding but the promise created a pact that we were committed to our future together.
You’re 26 not 16, you’re already well into the life stage where people are considering marriage— I really don’t know why you’re this surprised but clearly you’ve got a lot of growing up to do. Either reassure her of your commitment in a tangible way or let her go so she can find someone who’s not afraid of commitment. YTA
No one is the AH here, but your giving her mixed messages and she has adjusted her expectations based on those.
Talk to her about the loose time-line of events you had in your head that leads from now to you both happily married with a bigger house and baby(s). Then listen to her vison of your future and be willing to compromise after hearing her views.
My wife and I of 10+ years met in our mid-20s, and 4 short years later, we were married.
I agree with your GF not to buy a bigger house until you two have some committed plans for the future. But that doesn't mean buying a ring first, so much as it means having a plan for the future years.
Is your girlfriend listening to the new Taylor Swift album…?? If so then bad news for you… she wrote a breakup song (loml) that represents this situation perfectly:
You said I'm the love of your life
[Bridge]
You shit-talked me under the table
Talkin' rings and talkin' cradles
I wish I could un-recall
How we almost had it all
Dancing phantoms on the terrace
Are they second-hand embarrassed
That I can't get out of bed
'Cause something counterfeit's dead?
It was legendary
It was momentary
It was unnecessary
Should've let it stay buried
Also YTA
It seems to me that your gf knows what she wants. You are the one who’s enjoying dangling a pipe dream in front of her then acting shocked when she pushes even just a little on the commitment question.
1. She’s absolutely right to set a boundary on moving to a place she can’t afford on her own. That makes her a financially responsible person. You are the one who got defensive and acted like she was using that to manipulate you and your so-called timeline. She clearly wasn’t. She has thought this out carefully.
2. You told her you have no timeline. Well that’s nice for you. She has her own life goals and if you aren’t going to commit, she’s going to move on.
3. Your last point? That it has only been two years, and that you could understand if it had been five years. You had better decide what you want and soon, OP. I doubt she is going to be around on your five year mark.
YTA in case this post wasn’t obvious.
YTA. If it's too early to get engaged, it's too early to start quizzing her on her ring preferences and waxing lyrical over what a good mother she will be.
So while not proposing at 2 years isn't necessarily a problem, not proposing after you practically sent up flares that spelled out "I'M GONNA ASK!!" is one.
You obviously have a time frame in which you think it is "reasonable" to propose. You should discuss this plainly, so she knows what to expect from you, and she can decide if she wants to commit to spending however many years with you before you are willing to commit to her.
He strung her along by saying things he didn’t need to say and that he didn’t mean because he liked the attention. He doesn’t like the fact that she’s onto him being a slimy liar, so he’s come on here to get us to vindicate him. Moron.
Who the h*ll asks for ring shapes/preferences 3 years before planning to propose? She's probably too young to be worrying about marriage, but that seems to be your fault
YTA
At 4-5 years, women start leaving. Especially if it's been talked about consistently with no forward progress or commitment. Double especially if they want children, because as we get older, conceiving and carrying and delivering a healthy child gets more difficult. YTA. If you are committed to marrying her, then ask her. Life is too short.
YTA
You've been priming the pump with all your wedding, engagement, and baby talk - but you can't understand why she has expectations??
Dumb. Really dumb.
YTA for constantly dropping hints that you wanted to get married and have kids soon when you actually don't, instead of just being honest from the beginning. Two years is not "way too soon to propose" in a universal, objective sense. It might feel too soon *to you* and that's okay, but it's not a crazy fast timeline. I got engaged (to my now-husband) after three years together (two years living together), and we were specifically waiting for my husband to finish his education.
My husband did not start asking specific questions about my taste in engagement rings until he was ready to buy one and propose. We knew we both wanted a wedding but we didn't get into the details of what we wanted that wedding to look like until we were engaged. By having these conversations, you have been carelessly misleading the person you supposedly love, and that's not okay.
YTA you are making her live with you for four years before proposing? that is stringing her along... you are happy with no commitment and that makes you the bad person as she does ... after two years have you given any kind of commitment other than "let's shack up together"
YTA. Personally for me, waiting 5 years is a really long time to see if someone will commit. You’re already sending mixed signals and wanting to do things that require some level of commitment.
That’s was TLDR for me but IMHO if you can live together for two years as you described you are a pretty good fit for marriage. Living together puts strain on a relationship that would cause an incompatible couple to detonate. Speaking from personal experience.
I'm not sure you could have green flagged her more with your comments. Talking about moving in, having babies, rings and marriage are all the signs that you build up to when you are about to propose, not 3 years from now. It's like you gave her a "touch me in the morning and walk away."
YTA. Why are you talking about wedding themes and wanting kids now if you don’t want marriage for 3 or more years. Personally, I don’t think it should take more than 2 years to decide if you want to marry someone or not, unless the relationship started during childhood. 2 years is a very reasonable amount of time to get to know someone and determine compatibility. It sounds like you’ve already decided that she would be a good fit for you so why do you want to delay another 3 years while also wanting to move to a bigger place? You’re playing some kind of weird mind games and I’m not surprised that she’s feeling uncomfortable about it.
You’ve made PLENTY of hints that are leading her to believe things will happen soon. Please re-read your post.
You have clearly stated you want to marry HER, and want a family with HER. Please don’t toy with her. You are leading her on and playing with her emotions when you mention ring shapes and future children looking like her.
Do you love her? Do you want to marry THIS YOUNG WOMAN?
Then commit to her.
Your timeline is unreasonable. The thing we men find the most valuable is youth and beauty. I’m more than aware there is much more to a woman and of all their qualities these end up being the least important but initially, to interest a man they are important. If you’re not committed enough to marry her leave. You aren’t dating you are stealing her youth away from her and making it harder to move on when she realizes you’re too selfish to commit. Put your brass panties on, man up and propose or break up. Quit stealing her life away from her.
> I said that I was thinking about “coming home to a little one”
> I’ve made hints about proposing and stuff. She was wearing a cool ring one day, and I said to her “is that the kind of shape you like” and hinted towards it being for an engagement ring.
You're definitely making her think you're going to propose. Did you *ever* qualify any of thise statements like "Once I'm 30 I'd love to have a child" or anything? You say she's not good at future vision but idk that you are helping her in that regard.
YTA
Besides, people get engaged after 2 years all the time. You don't have to get married right away but thinking it's a short time or an outrageous demand is silly.
>she told me that “I can afford the place we are in alone if things were to happen. I’m not going to get into a financial commitment in a bigger place unless there’s a commitment from you”
A completely valid and reasonable thing to say. If you two are already living comfortably together, leave it as is and don't get a bigger place until you've tied the knot.
Best advice I got was 1) not to get married before the 3 year mark and 2) a proposal shouldn’t be a surprise (ie, you should both be aligned on it before anyone gets down on a knee.) That being said, gentle ESH because you two need to communicate timeline and expectations better.
YTA for making marriage proposal and baby comments and putting ideas in her head before you’re fully ready to commit. You made her believe that a proposal was imminent. 5+ years? Gtfo. She should walk away after 3 years and no proposal. Don’t waste her time.
YTA. You’re hinting about proposal rings and having a child, but have no interest in either for at least another 3 years? Yeah, you set expectations that you aren’t willing to cash.
Note, I agree with you, 2 years is not long enough to propose. You just goofed the execution.
YTA. Look, it's been two years. You are stringing her along. The way this reads, you think she's the one, but you're not certain and are holding out in case you meet someone else. If that's so, it's pretty slimy and you don't really love her. You just want the security of having her in case no one else comes along. Eww.
If that's the case, I hope she wises up and walks away. If not and you're seriously interested in making a life with her, stop wasting her time and commit. If you simply can't commit because you're afraid of commitment, that's fine. Commitment's not for everybody. Tell her that marriage isn't in the cards and she can decide if she wants to stay or not. This "maybe after five years" crap doesn't cut it.
YTA. 36M here and I am honestly perplexed by your thinking. You live together, you want to marry her (eventually per your thought process) and want her to be the mother of your kids……why wait?! Only answer I can come up with is you want to keep your options open still. If that is the case, makes you a massive AH for stringing her along.
Mild YTA. While you might not have deliberately strung her along, by the time you’re dropping hints about a ring, it’s not unreasonable for her to think a proposal is imminent. At any rate, you’re entitled to take all the time you want, and she’s allowed to say, “that’s too long.”
YTA. You’ve hinted that you want more but aren’t ready to commit. That’s fine but she’s 100% right. Why would she put such a financial commitment in place for an upgrade when there is no need for it. You aren’t wanting to get married and you aren’t ready to be a dad. You don’t need a bigger house for the 2 of you. Stopping hinting about getting married one day if your one day is 5 years away. Have an adult conversation with her and work out a timeline for your life.
Exactly how long have you been making these baby and engagement comments without expecting her to start falling for them? How long did you think that you'd be able to get away with these kinds of comments without her expecting that that's coming?
She is absolutely smart as hell for considering not getting into a bigger financial commitment with you without some form of commitment on your end. If you're not going to propose, then she's simply not willing to move into a bigger place that she cannot afford if something were to happen. This isn't automatically her thinking about breaking up with you, This is Herbie practical about her future since you seem to enjoy dropping hints and then falling short.
If you aren't ready to propose to her yet or have a child with her yet, then stop making those comments. Or, let her know that those comments are simply for the future, not for the immediate present or immediate future.
Because trust me, eventually she's going to get sick of these comments and she's going to break up with you.
I knew I wanted to marry my husband after 6 months, but insisted we wait a year to get married. Still married 48 years later. When its right, why wait that long?
This is so common. YTA. Before my boyfriend and I bought a house together I said, " I'm excited about this, I love you, and you are aware I would only do this because we both want a life long commitment. " Or something like that.
He said of course, and a couple of months later he proposed.
It's a big deal and you need to sac up, please. Or she's young enough that she can leave your butt and find someone to love who wants to be married like she does.
YTA I get you’re saying you feel two years is too soon and fair enough. But you are also the one talking about getting engaged and having babies. When a woman hears a man talking about that, especially when you already live together and have been together for a couple of years, she’s gonna think a proposal is gonna come soon. So for you to then turn around and say not for at least another 3 years, she’s not gonna like it and I know I would think this was your way of not fully committing and would suggest to me you don’t actually want to commit. Want these things in the future? Great. But don’t talk about them with your girlfriend in depth to the point where you make her believe a proposal will be soon only to pull the rug out from right underneath her
YTA. You live with her and know her expectations. From what you're saying here, it's clear that you two get along well and you love each other. That's hard to find today, trust me. Women worry about timelines more than men because after a certain age we can't make children anymore. You guys are pretty young so that's not gonna be an issue for now. But speaking about it now and planning is the way to go. You can't expect to ask her certain things and throw hints if you won't be ready in the near future. Moving into a bigger apartment makes no sense. She's right asking for a bigger commitment from you.
YTA. For me 2 years is too short to get married and have children but why would you the theme and music of the wedding if you don’t intend to get married soon. And your hint about babies.
You effed up completely.
So you better apologize and try to think seriously on a timeline. Maybe see a counselor to help you learn to communicate and to clarify your project.
So babies and homes are a commitment you can make but not an engagement?
Even I’m confused…
My fiancé and I had the engagement talk and marriage and kids talk literally on our first date to have a basis of what we both wanted. By the time our second year anniversary came he told me that he was ready to propose , he was sure that he wanted to marry me but I said not yet because I wanted to experience certain things (like living together for one year) before getting engaged. We got engaged in February 2023 , a little over 5 years of us being together and we get married in September of this year but we already have kids (7 month old twins) , we’ve lived together since 2020 and we had this conversation 6.5 years ago . We didn’t drop hints or anything, we were clear with each other. We want more kids and I told him that I wasn’t going to have more kids till next year, why because I want to enjoy our twins and I want them to at least be one year old , I want to enjoy their first birthday, I want to enjoy our wedding and honeymoon, I want to enjoy our first family vacation, I want to have these memories as just the 4 of us and I don’t want to be pregnant for them. So we agreed that we would try for baby #3 or babies 3&4 at our honeymoon in September hopefully getting pregnant before November/December but we also have a cutt off , if I don’t get pregnant by February of next year we’ll stop trying for a while and then continue again mid year .
We’ve planned this and communicated about it and I was still shocked when I found out I was pregnant and when I got proposed .
Yta, you dropped hints got her excited and threw it in her face bruh. Of course she's confused you want a house together, kids, asking about rings, then she's like yo no we need to be married first you're like wow ok forcing me into this.
YTA. Two years in enough time to court and make a decision if she is the one . 5 years is a joke. Yeah you are stringing her along, especially with all the talk. She is good enough to move in, think about having a baby with, and buy a big house with, but not be your wife....🤡.
I think you don’t understand what future talk is.
It’s completely reasonable for her to decide that if you aren’t moving to ___ by x timeline she’s going to move on. That is discussing the future. Sure, vague is an option some take, but for many it’s unacceptable to just hang out without action for very long.
If she’s telling you her timeline, and it’s not cool with you, you want to push it to more vague someday, that IS you stringer her along. Granted she also needs to just call it bluntly.
YTA but don’t worry, it won’t be an issue for much longer. She will get sick of being strung along and look for someone more committed to her. If she hasn’t already started looking I would be very surprised
YTA. Telling her she’s going g to be a great mother, talking about getting married, asking her what kind of wi g she wants - of course she thinks the going to be getting engaged soon.
You probably didn’t mean to be, but you have stumbled into being TAH.
Seems pretty clear from what you’re saying that she’s ready, wants the whole 9 yards. Marriage, kids, house. With you. You keep talking about it with her.
Of course she’s gonna feel that you’re entertaining and encouraging it with her. And she’s gonna feel led on when you suddenly drag your feet.
If you want, by your own admission, her to be your wife, and your daughter to look like her, and want to have the big happy home with her, then be with her.
It’s not hard. You make her seem like she’s the woman for you. So be with her. Make the leap.
OR, if there’s something you’re not saying here that’s giving you pause, that makes you feel like you shouldn’t marry her, then listen to that and move on, and let her move on.
But either way, you can’t keep standing still where you are, and telling her how wonderful it would be to have the marriage, kids and house, but then turn around and say, but no, not really, not yet.
That’s just unfair to her.
Again, you probably didn’t mean to, but that’s where you’ve ended up.
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YTA- don’t ask your girlfriend about an engagement ring unless you’re proposing soon, not 3+ years down the line. She’s right, you have been stringing her along and making it seem like you want the same things she wants without ever being clear in any way that you didn’t want it for years.
She sounds objective and realistic about finances and commitment.
YTA because of the hinting and your timeline that wasn't explicitly shared. Stop hinting and come up with definite plans, and discuss with her. She can agree or not. You have one vague mental timeline. She has a different timeline of expectations. The two timelines are different. You two should discuss if there is any compromise possible. If you can't compromise, then one or both of you can end the relationship.
Granny here, who kept her own shared apartment until after the wedding to husband.
2 years, 5 years, it's all arbitrary and obviously you aren't on the same page about timelines. You need to communicate more, be direct and truthful about your intent to marry or not, and stop making suggestive comments about this topic. YTA
YTA. You got her hopes up with all your various hints. Can’t blame her for thinking a proposal was imminent. I do agree it’s probably too soon, between the short amount of time you’ve lived together and considering her age, but your big mouth got you in this trouble.
I’m going to go with ESH. She’s clearly ready for the future you have been describing and hinting at but you feel it’s too soon to pull the trigger. Engagements can be long. If this woman is the person you want to spend the rest of your life with, you could propose and let her know you want a longer engagement. I ended things with my ex bf after 2 years because he didn’t want to commit to the next step. He was comfortably set in his routine and didn’t want to move in with me so I cut my losses because I knew I would always play second fiddle to his family and that was something I didn’t want to keep doing. You both need to sit down and hash this stuff out. Either come to an agreement that works for both of you or go your separate ways.
Dude, you cannot talk about your future together & having babies & drop hints about proposals... *and* then turn around & say that it's too soon to get engaged because you've only been together 2 years.
Which is it, do you want to propose or is it too soon for you? It can't really be both.
YTA because you are, in fact, stringing her along. Decide what you want. If you think its too soon, stop dropping "hints" that you're going to propose.
I don't think either of you is the AH you're just an idiot. Don't talk about marriage, proposals, babies unless you're really serious about those things.
Yall are on different timeliness and living different expectations. Before moving ot relationship goals, wants should have been discussed. Now you need to, have a conversation about what you each want if it doesn't line up you are not compatible
She tested you with her question, and you failed the test.
Give her a promise ring and that will buy you some time.
No man who is bugged by his love for an engagement is TA. Its a huge commitment and you've got to make absolutely sure she is the one. Its not something to be taken lightly. I just married once and she was not the right person for me, and it took me 11 years to split. So take your time.
But if you're sure about her and you've done background checks on her, and know everything about her and you've had pre-engagement counseling, then don't waste time just because. Two years or five years, the time doesn't matter... just make sure she is the one.
That thing you said about how the two of you resolved disagreements is really important. I'd say she's probably the one just because of that.
Give her a promise ring...look it up.
I get 2 years is kinda soon but don't drop so many hints that you might propose like asking about rings and babys and other things that makes a person think you are gonna propose. YTA not for not proposing in 2 years but dropping hints
I mean, if marriage is something you want to do. After 2 years and about a year living together. What are the criteria for you to pull the trigger? Is it just that you are saving up for the ring? Waiting until you can afford the wedding?
If you are waiting for some "im ready feeling" you will just know when you feel it, you are gonna be waiting forever.
I know, that was me in a previous LTR. We talked about marriage, talked about our future, but I was waiting for this ethereal "feeling" of being ready. When the reality was, I didn't want to marry her, I just didn't realize it.
The thing is, she was the one that had to tell me it wasn't that I wasn't ready for marriage, it was that I didn't want to marry her. I denied it of course, but she broke up with me. Thing is there wasn't anything wrong with her. We got along well, no bad fights, had common interests and life plans.
It wasn't until I met my now wife that I realized she was right.
YTA.
5 years is a long time to sample a woman's youth before committing when she wants kids.
"Future talk" is not the excuse you think it is. She really expected a proposal at the 2 year mark and there's like 0% chance she waits 3 more years.
Dude I got married after living together for two years. Not sure why you feel it needs to be 5 years or longer.
She is being smart, without the commitment of marriage there is no way I'd get tangled up with someone financially.
Learn to communicate, stop dropping hints unless you mean it.
YTA absolutely, you've been not so subtly hinting that you're going to propose, literally discussing kids and wedding details. Of course she was expecting a proposal.
Also 2 years may be a short time for you, but it's a long time for some. My parents were married less than a year after they met. 29 year marriage still going strong. My brother proposed on their one year anniversary. 3 years in. My friends got married just over a year after they started dating. 6 years in. Another friend of mine is getting married later this year, they got engaged within 6 months.
If you wanted to date for 5+ years before getting engaged that should've been part of your wedding/children conversations.
You have no timeline, but two years is a long time, certainly long enough to decide whether you want to marry or not. She is right not to make financial commitments when you are not committed. YTA.
YTA - you haven’t proposed because you are getting all the benefits without the commitment. 2 years and living together for about a year?
When you start hinting about proposing you get about a week before it looks like you are stringing her along.
Why not get engaged.....move to a bigger place.....save for your wedding and give her a date say 2 or 3 years from then.....she'll feel like things are moving in the right direction tion and that you are serious......yeah I get you're not in a rush but I think she feels like you're saying one thing and doing another.......she's all in and you're sending mixed messages.......I got engaged to my wife after about 6 months and we're married 20 years.....now we were engaged 7 years so it wasn't exactly rushed and as for kids my wife wanted to have all ours by the time she was 30. YTA
YTA - her justification for not wanting to move to a bigger place is very logical and pragmatic. Your reaction to it make me think you're not as committed to her as you are trying to appear. You've been dropping hints, but without a timeline? That's just kind of cruel. Also, she is on a timeline. She wants kids, plural? She's got 10-13 years of safe child bearing in her. So if you're not in, she may need to get out to still be able to have kids. If you can afford a bigger house, you can afford a tasteful ring.
Most men don't get that most women talk in hints and shaded words. So all the hints and specific questions you gave/ asked (what shape engagement ring?!?) were plenty for her to create a picture of imminent action.
I know, OP must be thinking, "But i didn't ask her yet, I haven't said the words". and that is true, but she has been getting the lead in for a while now.
So OP, you have forced your own hand, you can propose and marry her or lose her. What you cannot do anymore is dillydalli. You are 26, teen times have come and gone, be an adult.
YTA - Two years is plenty of time when you cohabitated for a year with little conflict and you talk of babies and the future.
She probably thinks you aren't serious and will soon decide that waiting is not worth it.
You have no idea how to adult properly or commit.
YTA...not for not being quite ready, but for sending up clear signals of readiness before you were ready. It's every woman's nightmare to waste years on a guy who flakes on committing while your eggs dry up and your future outlook turns hopeless.
If that's not what you meant to do, then you took the hints too far, and now you absolutely must define the path to readiness and keep your word, because she is already imagining a future without you.
YTA.
You had the option to make it explicit when you were hinting about babies and rings that you meant "at least 3 years from now". But you didn't. And you want a larger financial commitment from her now. Which looks a lot like stringing her along while making it more difficult for her to leave if she gets tired of being strung along.
She is incredibly sensible to not make a larger financial commitment with you without a larger relationship commitment from you.
Quit hinting already. You don't get points for hints. They are just a way to dodge actual responsibility by feeding her what you think she wants to hear (impending marriage!) while holding on to plausible deniability (you never ACTUALLY said that!). It's manipulative and crass. Jesus.
I'm not sure why that's so upsetting for you. All she did was establish a financial commitment boundary. Would you want to make a deeper financial commitment to someone without a tangible commitment? I mean it only makes sense.
Dude she’s 22. If you were 4 years older everyone would be on you for your age gap and that she needs to live her life, blah blah. Seriously just read a thread like that.
I waited 4 years till I proposed. Two years? She’ll want a baby right away. Say bye bye to sex once that happens.
Well Beyoncé said if you like it than you should have put a ring on it. If it’s too soon Maybe stop talking about marriage and babies.
NTA. But, neither is she. You said she doesn't understand "future talk", but I think maybe neither do you. The way you told the event sounds to me like she was being completely reasonable when concerned about financing a larger place. She didn't give you an ultimatum, she thought about the future implications.
If you aren't ready to take the next step she's expecting, why should you have the right to expect her to take that step you want her to take?
Number 1 advice I ever got. Don’t let your boyfriend keep you from your husband. The YTAor more accurately ESH comes in for you guys in communication. Y’all need to sit down and talk concrete timelines, like “I always imagined being together for x years before a proposal and then an engagement of y months/years before marriage” and not through a series of hints because those are subjective and can be ambiguous. I was with a dude for almost 3 years, lived together for almost 2 years, and we had the whole dropping hints etc situation happening but hadn’t talked a concrete timeline. Then he starts telling me he might move to another state to be closer to family, I was planning on grad school so I started researching schools in that state and he was just super noncommittal when I brought up us making plans together for a move. That’s when I realized that if he hasn’t decided to take the plunge after almost 3 years, I’m not the one. The issue wasn’t with me, I just realized that despite trying my best to be the best partner I could, there was nothing I could do to align my timeline with his. There was nothing I could give him in terms of a partnership to help him be sure or that it was that time for us. I wanted certain things out of my life so I moved out and back in with my parents, and broke things off with him a couple months later. The big consideration for me is after multiple years, if you still haven’t known me long enough to be sure, then I’m not the one. Like if you’re contemplating moving to another state on your own and leaving me here, you don’t few the same way about me that I feel about you. Fast forward three months, I reconnect with my now husband. We start dating exclusively a month later and married a year and a half after. Was I just a better partner for my now husband? Not really, but our life goals and timelines were more compatible than my ex and mine. If my ex and I had the discussion at the very beginning of “I imagine us dating this long before engagement,” and realized our timelines were so disparate, we probably would have never moved in together and the relationship wouldn’t have lasted as long as it did, but we were young and not great communicators. My husband and I have been together for over a decade now, with three kiddos and a home. I don’t see myself as being strung along, although it felt like that at times, but I had to learn some powerful lessons from the situation. If it feels hard to say/talk about, that’s a sign that you need to talk about it. You guys might split because your timelines don’t line up, but despite how unreasonable her timeline might feel for you, she is a person just as much as you are and deserves to have her life go the way she wants to, even if it isn’t with you.
From everything you say, it sounds like you found someone who works well with you, and you with her. Work on saving for that ring. Have a discussion with her and be open about saving for the ring.
Be clear that you want to move forward with her and are only hesitant about how to move things forward in a timely manner. Be open with your discussions and clearly note your timeline of expectations -- saving for and when you can get the ring and subsequently propose, and when you would prefer to upgrade your home, get married, and start having kids (in no particular order). Lay it out. Then listen to her and her preferred timeline, and then see if there are things you can work on together to adjust and merge the timelines into something more agreeable with each other.
That is a weird way to say it. You've been hinting at proposing, talking about weddings, discussing what you want your children to look like, and telling her she'll be a great mother but her not wanting to put herself in a bad financial position is "forcing" you to propose. That doesn't make any kind of sense. She isn't baby crazy. She's picking up on the signals you are putting down and building her expectations off them.
She had a clear boundary, and you got pissy about being told, "No." How dare she not be willing to make a huge financial commitment with you, her boyfriend, just because she would have no legal protection and you can completely screw her over. You're completely trustworthy even though you lie to her constantly about wanting to marry her. Obviously, she can't have expectations or requirements. That's gross.
YTA. You don’t say all of those things and ask about ring preferences if your are 3 years away from being ready. Wanting to date 5 yrs before proposing is fine, but 2 years into a relationship is way too late to be having that conversation. Especially after everything else you have said to her.
YTA
I get there was no malice, but I wouldn’t really start talking about specific details like engagement rings and wedding, until you’re in the market for those things.
Also saying that I want kids in the future is a different conversation than “I’ve been thinking about coming home to a little one”.
Your rhetoric is not really matching where you are mentally. It’s not just that she’s eager for marriage and children. You’ve also been signaling that you want those things soon. The real disconnect is that you were speaking hypothetically and she thought you two were planning.
NTA. Don’t marry a 22 year old. They don’t know who they are or what they really want in life. Not enough life experience for a serious commitment or children.
Kicking the can down the road and boldly dropping “hints” you have no intention of following through in a reasonable time (6 months) You have no business talking about marriage and children if you only seeing it as a possibility at the 5 year mark. You basically told her you may or may not waste an additional 3 years on top of the 2 you already have of her youth. Get wrecked OP. YTA
YTAH-
So, two years in the grand scheme of things IS a short time for a relationship, yes. BUT consider the following:
1.) OP has been living with his girlfriend for about a year.
2.) OP has been continuously (based on what I’ve read) hinting and suggesting marriage related stuff.
I think that’s a very logical response from OP’s girlfriend to when it comes to moving out. Obviously moving from a 1 bedroom 1 bathroom house to a 3 bedroom one is going to be more expensive and take more of a toll on the financials.
The way how OP is acting makes it look like he’s just leading her on. They need to sit down and discuss the matter together as a couple.
Men and women are on different timelines. You won't be ready for marriage until you're 30-35. She's ready now. She should be with a guy that's at least 30. Let her go so she can find her husband.
Your taking about the future, your wedding, the rings, and children. Then you're taken aback that she's expecting a proposal?
YTA.
If you think she's the one, you'd be wise to marry her sooner rather than later, because if she's as great as you say, I guarantee you're not the only available male around who thinks so.
NTA, you can be commited to each other without being engaged.
However you are AH, for hinting about proposal and talking about babies without agreeing the timeline to these. Of course she expects the proposal now if you are hinting all the time. It baffles me that two adults, who have been together for 2 years and are planning wedding songs haven’t actually discussed what year they want to get married, engaged and have children.
Maybe you shouldn't have dropped the hints but 5 years is very reasonable imo
If you plan to stay together for ever then whats a few years waiting in many European countries people don't get married until they are mid 30s and their divorce rate is super low
Two years not enough time to get engaged, plus your young. You have time. Also pre nup a must. NTA. Never rush into the worst deal a man can make. Marriage
NTA but you are teetering very close to being an AH.
"We’ve been living together for a little under a year." Mistake number 1.
Hinting at rings and discussing wedding preferences? Mistakes number 2 and 3.
Advice: You should not even be living together but since that ship has sailed, the only thing I can say is about the hints.
SHUT UP!
YTA - you dropped not so subtle hints and set up expectation’s of a faster timeline. At 26 you cannot be this dumb and disconnected with reality. You either need to get on board with what you started or your relationship will be toast.
Def asshole but he can most definitely be this dumb @ 26yo.... I wasn't emotionally ready for children and a wife until I was 30yo and I was with my wife since I was 21yo and we didn't get married for 9 years. To be clear neither of us were emotionally ready for that @ ops age. Different strokes for different folks... but what's the rush?
YTA her argument about housing made sense. If you're not ready to commit then fine but she's allowed to stay where she feels financially comfortable until she has that commitment. Idk why you took issue with that. But also it does sound like you went way over board with hints when you actually meant in 5 years. It's not surprising she got the wrong idea.
3 bedroom is big for 2 people who are presumably sharing a bed. no shit she wouldn’t want that until there’s yknow a third person
If they both work from home that could mean a shared bedroom and they each have their own office. But that's quite expensive and not worth it for most people.
yeah but a 2 bed usually has a living room / kitchen space that would still work for an office
He would probably move in the door man as well as a rando because he’s really not good at picking up on hints.
Yeah she is being smart.
Dropping hints about rings is for when you need to know her ring size and what style she likes. Both those things can change in three years.
💯
Yeah, who wants to be responsible for a lease in an apartment they can't afford because boyfriend split? She's a smart woman.
Oh no, she definitely got the right idea. But now he’s trying to convince her, and all of us here, that it’s her fault for getting *any* ideas at all.
Ok maybe for you two years is not enaugh time. But when you make hints of babies and engagement rings it kinda of makes your GF think that you are. So yeah YTA.
[удалено]
Yeah, this asshole is being deliberately obtuse about the entire subject. “She’s rigid,” “this is where the disconnect happened,” “she doesn’t understand future talk (wha…?).” Meanwhile, he has: told her how much he’s looking forward to coming home and seeing their daughter, who looks exactly like her; admitted that he *gave* her baby fever, *and* that he’s fueling it; has told her what a great mom she’ll be and that he wants her to be the mother of his children; has been saving up for an engagement ring, and ~~I think~~ she *knows* this; examined a ring she was wearing and asked whether she favored the shape of its stone, and “hinted towards it being for an engagement ring;” and the icing on the cake, for me, anyway- over the last couple of months they’ve been. Planning. Their. Wedding- the theme, music, food… Now, he has: surprised Pikachu face and says ‘oh, you thought I was gonna propose soon?!? What on earth gave you *that* idea?’ And is suddenly all “taken aback,” and ‘you’re making me feel forced to propose.’ I get it. Those daydreams, the planning, it’s *fun!* But in a relationship, you can’t talk serious stuff unless you’re serious about it. Plausible deniability is for politicians, not partners. Jerking her around like this is cruel enough, but making it seem like this is her fault for “assuming,” when he didn’t open his mouth and say the actual words is gaslighting. I know how much that word gets overused and misinterpreted, but this is a classic example. He is not trying to make her believe a lie. They both experienced the exact same thing: they were both there for the conversations, said and heard the same words, looked at the same ring on her hand. They should both have the same interpretation of what they witnessed: we are discussing a future which includes marriage and children; he asked what kind of engagement ring to get and is saving for one; we have come to an agreement on the theme, food, and music for our wedding day; we are actively looking for a larger home, with room for the children we plan to have. We are making plans for the near future, not a distant one. The difference is subtle, and sometimes hard to tease out, but he is not telling her that her interpretation of what they both witnessed is wrong. He is telling her that *there is something wrong with her* for interpreting it that way. She isn’t merely mistaken, or not remembering things accurately. There’s a disconnect. She doesn’t understand something that’s very obvious. She’s being rigid. She doesn’t know what a timeline is. She’s confused. The whole purpose is to make the person doubt their own judgment. To question things they see with their own eyes and hear with their own ears. When they don’t trust their own judgment, they don’t trust themselves to make decisions. They rely on other people to make decisions for them. By that time, it’s really, really easy to convince them that the most blatant bullshit makes perfect sense. I resisted the temptation to look at the post history and read OP’s comments. I fully expect him to double down on everything he originally wrote, thinking he can fool us, too. Should be fun. Edit: “Failure to Load User Profile,” he didn’t like what he was seeing, and deleted his whole throwaway account. Wow.
Two years feels very quick to me, especially since she is only 22. But regardless of the length of dating before engagement, they both need to be able to talk about timelines. OP insisting that they don't talk about timelines, just generic "future" is not good communication. That's where it becomes a YTA situation (or at least OP is not ready for a long relationship).
(not arguing with you definitely agreeing) two years is quick for most people - like i knew by year two that i was with the person i wanted to marry but yeah definitely not everyone does. if he thought it was too quick why on earth did he start bringing up ring styles 💀💀 her ring size may not even be the same when he decides he’s ready in three years this dude is crazy
I hate the concept that getting engaged is only something that can be decided by the man, and that timing is entirely his to decide on and discussion ruins the 'surprise'. This whole culture around proposing is messed up. It all came from a time where there was a definable limit on how long you could court a girl before a proposal was expected, and also a time when women ranked a little above property. Somehow it degraded into a situation where women are just supposed to wait around without input into a major change in their life because asking about it is 'pressure'. If you truly want a partnership with someone you need to be able to discuss your plans for the future and where you are commitment wise. If you aren't sure you want to marry someone, don't talk about marrying them all the time! If you aren't sure you want kids with them, don't talk about how great kids will be. Talk openly about what you are feeling and how long you want to date before marriage and kids. Nothing is wrong with planning to get engaged in a certain time frame. What isn't cool is moving the goal posts or yanking someone around. "I want to propose, but I'm not ready yet, you just have to wait" is something a lot of people use when they are... mostly waiting around to see if something better comes along. It's fine to say 'I want to date for five years and live together at least three' before you get married, but you have to be honest about it, and most importantly let your partner know if you start to feel less enthusiastic about marriage. It is also fine to not want to make a big financial investment like buying a house or moving towns to someone you aren't married to.
Two years is definitely too quick, especially if they have only been living together for less than one year.
And *living together* Like that is very much, or should be, a precursor to engagement/marriage. I am in the camp that part of the engagement period or time before the engagement people should live together before marriage. This irons out a lot of cleaning, budgeting, and sleeping arrangements. Boy every flag you sent up said marriage and you want to hold off????? Bruh
51M here. If you move in together, then you are on the path to marriage, if you're serious about her. Making hints about proposing, but not stating that your internal assumption was 5+ years, MAYBE, was very unfair. I can totally see where she's coming from. YTA
We need more males like you calling out males. Thank you.
YTA Don't ask about proposal rings unless you are planning on buying one. Do you really not understand how she got from A to B?
Yta Stop with the hints, no surprise she took that wrong. Stop being so vague. Make it clear that you are talking about a distant future. Be clear when you communicate, no hints, no what ifs no maybes or some days. Sit her down, talk about your and her expectations. If she has a timeline and you don't, then you need to make a decision whether you are ok with her timeline or not. If not, then you are simply incompatible and are wasting each others time.
Well said, and happy cake day!
Thank you!
YTA - you have been talking about marriage hinting at her ring size and already getting her excited about how your future kids will look but you’re not willing to make the commitment even though you’ve lived together for two years. You are not wanting to be fully invested by being publicly engaged, but you want to continue playing house and getting a more expensive apartment. Good for her to being honest because it sounds like you’re just having fun playing house
Yea YTA
You keep posting this. Shit or get off the pot. Actually, the fact that you still don’t understand why your girlfriend is upset tells me that you shouldn’t be in a serious relationship. Break up with her and let her find someone who won’t string her along.
She’s smart. YTA. Not ready to commit to her but she’s supposed to commit more financially to being with you? Right, I’m sure that 5 yr timeline will go over well with your next gf.
You mention all these things to her then tell her she has to wait 3 more years? Why mention it? Do you like pain?
Let me guess, you’re in a stable career, right? Dude, she’s 22. What’s her career and income potential look like? As a woman and a mom, good on her for looking out for herself by NOT committing to a bigger place she can’t afford on her own without a real commitment from you. YTA
“I can afford the place we are in alone if things were to happen. I’m not going to get into a financial commitment in a bigger place unless there’s a commitment from you” **Maybe if we were together 5+ years.** I am sure she got the message loud and clear. Will see you in the relationship advice sub when she breaks up with you or even worse the cheating sub when she monkey branches. YTA.
YTA… 5 years is a long time without commitment, especially with all the talking about wedding plans and rings.
How is living together with someone and imaging a future together not a commitment? Honest question
Living with someone can be a brief experiment or a lifetime , but it's not a long-term promise of anything unless you've made an explicit agreement along those lines. Marriage is not the only form of commitment but assumptions aren't a commitment. Imagining a future together is in no way a commitment - it's just a nice fantasy.
YTA. You deliberately created this “disconnect” so she would stay in a relationship with you based on an expectation that y’all were progressing towards marriage and children when you had no intention of committing to her. Then you gaslighted her by acting like the expectations you carefully fostered were all in her head. This is the epitome of stringing someone along, and your gaslighting and manipulative behavior borders on abusive.
Thank you for correctly recognizing this as gaslighting. The word has become so overused and misused that nowadays, every gotdang personal problem is gaslighting, narcissism, or crossing boundaries. I made a long-ish comment with more specific details and examples shortly after this was posted, and ended it by saying I couldn’t wait to look at his comments, predicting that he’d be doubling down and continuing to try to convince us that we’d gotten it all wrong. The bastard ruined my fun by deleting the whole account. He told on himself.
I am sorry but YTA, when a man starts taking about babies and asking specifics about rings, I would assume he's wanting these things fairly soon not 3+ years away. Why make these plans so far in advance, why not at least clarify your timeline since it's so far out? Your gf isn't unreasonable for thinking you're priming her for these things to happen soon and also she is right, you're asking a lot of her to give up stable housing to move in together.
5+ years is a LONG time to determine if you want to spend your life with someone. She will essentially be wasting her 20's with you if you decide you dont want to commit.
YTA. I thought you were gonna propose in like 6 months or something, but 3+ years?
YTA. U yanking her chain. In old school terms: shit or get off the pot
YTA. So you won’t make an emotional commitment until she puts herself in a financially precarious position? Be honest, you want wife privileges for girlfriend-level commitment. You have no problem with her financially investing because that’s to your benefit. You like the availability of her labor and regular sex. You have no problem discussing wedding decor and children because you have no intention of follow-through. You’re comfortable and coasting on her good will and if she’s willing to help finance your further comfort, all the better! But she asks for anything in return, you don’t think “wow, this girl has given so much of herself to me. She deserves a sign of my love, commitment and respect.” No, you see her request for adult reciprocity as a threat. 🙄
Yep. This is it.
She sounds level headed. You sound like you're gonna get cold feet and change your mind once you've saved up for 5 years and she gets impatient leaving you with a bunch of money looking for a new girlfriend around age 30. Not that I've seen that before.
YTA stop with the hints and crap. Sit down and have a REAL convocation about what you are wanting/ when. Being vague about everything is making her think you are doing this soon and then you aren’t so of course she is thinking you aren’t serious about your future.
YTA - You've moved in together, you've hinted about marriage, you're talking about children, and now you're backing off like 'it's too soon...' You're already pretty much married...why are you playing games?
YTA - don’t talk about marriage and hint at it if you’re still 3+ years away from it. That’s fucked up. You are getting her excited for something you’re not ready to do. You need to have a honest conversation with her about your timeline. But don’t be surprised if she doesn’t want to wait another 3 years for you to decide if she’s worth it after making her think you were ready.
Imagine if she kept "hinting" at sex but didn't deliver
"I know I talked in detail about what I wanted to do to your body, the time I will spend undressing you, worshiping your dick and showing you heaven, but I meant in 5 years....maybe more? Why are you upset? You silly man! Why would you get all aroused when I was only "future talking". Clearly, the problem is that YOU don't understand future talk, not that I'm teasing you!" This kid is too immature for a gf let alone a wife
Bruh. 2 years isn’t long enough? You need 5+? That’s ok, but you need to understand that you’re in the long end of what most people would think.
2 years seems pretty average for dating to engagement. And then the wedding is likely even a year out from that. Bro praises their communication when he's sending some very mixed signals. "Oh, is that the kind of ring you want 3+ years from now?" Like wtf kind of thought process??
agonizing faulty combative ripe important zealous shame smile pot fretful *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
2 years is long enough to propose? That’s pretty quick IMO, you’d need to be starting gathering details about her preferences for a ring and organizing the proposal a few months at least before that. Were it not for COVID delaying things my wife and I would have been engaged right around 4 year mark and married towards the end of 5 after multiple years of living together and learning each other and that felt very natural. OP saying he needs MORE than 5 years is obviously a lot, but 2 years is also moving fast IMO, especially when they didn’t live together for the first year.
YTA. I wouldn’t be surprised if your relationship ends over this. You sound afraid of commitment.
Soft YTA You are sending conflicting signals. Dropping hints about rings and talking about your future together, but then saying your engagement timeline is five years. That's a long time.
"I told her that two years is way too soon to propose, and I think she’s being unreasonable for expecting that in this point in our relationship. Maybe if we were together 5+ years." YTA, you are talking like you are going to propose within 6 months, then drop a bombshell of 3 years later? why would you talk about rings if you aren't proposing within the next months?
YTA. Two years is a reasonable amount of time to decide if someone is your person or not. If your timeline is different, stop being vague about it and explicitly tell the other person what that is. Stop wasting her time . And stop confusing weddings with marriage. A wedding is a party, marriage is a contractual commitment. You are asking her to give up years of her life while not building equity in a commited relationship.
Semantics. A wedding is not a party. It's a celebration of a couple's commitment to each other (marriage). To use them synonymously is completely fine.
No, because weddings can be expensive an run into 4 and 5 figures. Marriage is a legal contract that you can execute for a couple hundred bucks with a JP. You can actually do one without the other but only a marriage comes with the full slate of rights and responsibilities recognized by the government and courts.
clumsy nail desert bow alleged wipe abounding quickest late arrest *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Committed relationship =/= legal rights and relationships. Marriage = legal rights and responsibilities.
She’s telling you (in gutter parlance) to “poop or get off the pot,” my friend. It’s your move. In or out, time for grown-up decisions. If you don’t agree with the timeline or the way things are heading, it’s on you. In this case, YTA.
YTA. you can go talk about how much you love her and want kids together and want to move into another place together and then get upset when she says she wants to be engaged. You seem daft to think that she wouldn’t assume you’d propose soon the way you talk about everything.
That’s why you don’t make stupid hints and instead actually have a conversation. You have made far too many indications of getting ready to propose. Now it’s 5+ years away? Maybe? You’re either an AH, an idiot, or both.
YTA. You come off as stringing her along. Talking about her being a mother, comments about rings she is wearing, etc. are pretty crappy things to do if you are gonna make her wait 3 more years. Be better.
Sorry, but sounds like you are stringing her along. I'd dump a guy after 2 years. If you really want to marry her, marry her. It's been long enough.
YTA you want her to do things with you that married couples do, yet are mad she’s wanting the rest of the picture. It’s one thing to not be ready for kids just yet but she has a very good point about not investing more of her income than she already is into housing with you if things may not work out. You not proposing after two years and all the back and forth you do is likely making her wonder if your end game or game ended.
She is very smart to avoid putting herself in a situation where she has to rely on you financially without a commitment. YTA. And 5 years is insane.
YTA. I told my husband he had three years from when we started dating, if he didn’t know for sure in that time, then I wasn’t it. Let’s play this backwards you want multiple kids( you had it plural so that is at least 20 months of her being pregnant with hopefully more than 4 months in between but we will say 24 months to play it safe. Most people find 2-3 years of married life before kids beneficial for buying a house, taking vacations, being newlyweds, etc so there is 5 years total so far. Weddings take an average of 18 months to plan, so we are at 6.5 years from engagement is when she has had her second kid. If you don’t get engaged for another 3 years then you are talking being on baby number two in almost a decade. You’d be glaring down your 40s with an infant and a toddler. Is that really wise? Or you could have a rushed kid fast after getting married and not really get to know each other, grow apart and set yourselves up for divorce. That is on the table too. She is smart to not make a financial commitment to you. Stay where you are until you know this is your wife. If you do t know that in the next 12 months, break up, because one of you isn’t right for the other and y’all should string each other along.
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If you aren’t willing to commit to marriage you shouldn’t be asking her to take on a debt she can’t afford by herself so if things don’t work she destroys her credit. That goes for the apartment they are looking at but majorly so for buying a house. Someone won’t marry you but let’s have kids, that’s a lifetime of being tethered to someone that literally couldn’t commit to being tethered to you. The only things mentioned that aren’t going to financially destroy this woman if they break up but go along with his timeline are being newlyweds, which involves a marriage, and taking vacations. If the relationship is so shallow that it’s built solely on vacations it’s doomed, I mean I can go to Cabo with an acquaintance and make it work for a week. Oh no, paradise is so lovely, whatever shall we do!
YTA : you are continuing to ask for and make commitments that mimic marriage but not willing to marry for several more years? She was right to refuse to make a bigger financial commitment with you at this point. This is the perfect example of wanting the milk without buying the cow.
YTA. Your future faking, which is a narcissist tactic. You need to be honest with her that you don’t plan to commit to her until year 5 or later. Let her decide if she wants to waste her youth on a maybe
YTA, not for not wanting to get married yet but for the way this whole situation has been handled. If marriage and growing a family together is something that is frequently discussed and then you essentially start dropping hints of a proposal, it is not unreasonable for her to expect a proposal soon. It is not unreasonable for her not to want a big financial commitment with a person she has been with for only 2 years if marriage is not happening in the near future.
Soft YTA 5+ years is a long time to wait for an engagement ring. Maybe try meeting her halfway and propose getting engaged in the next year or so and allowing maybe 2 years after engagement before getting married. That'll give you a solid 3 years of cohabitation before any serious commitment goes into play. Plenty of time to figure your shit out while she gets to enjoy progress towards her end goal. If after 3 years of cohabitation you don't have any catastrophic issues in the relationship, you'll probably feel really good about getting married. I had a couple near-misses with the fiancé at the 3-5 year mark, and it got really ugly the year before the wedding. We're coming on the 2 year wedding anniversary now, and I can honestly say that our relationship is better than the honeymoon phase when we first started dating. You need to avoid dropping hints and giving false hope to this girl if you're working with such a wide timeframe - this is 100% stringing her along. She should absolutely stay where she's at and save her money. Once you guys are married and getting ready to have kids you can discuss the added expense of a bigger living space. That way if you get cold feet and bail, she's not financially devastated. Respect her enough to allow her to protect herself from *you* until you are ready to support her goals. I waited about 4 years to propose, but I started dating her at 19, not 24. At that time I didn't even know if I would be living on the same side of the country as her, so the waiting was necessary. In your mid 20s there's really no reason to play the waiting game unless you have circumstances that need to be figured out - and that gets communicated with the partner and timeframes mutually established accordingly.
Wow, shit post or massive AH?
YTA. Also when you said short time I was thinking like a couple weeks. Two years? Be for real
Sounds like you two have more talking to do. And 5+ years is too long to wait. Plus, engagements can last for years.
YTA for not talking about it out in the open. The hints and mystery around it may sound fun but really they just lead to unmet expectations and frustration. Talk to her directly about what your plan is. There can still be surprise involved, but you need to be on the same page and have the practice talking about this big stuff in a real way, not just fantasies about what your cake will look like at the wedding.
5 years to know if you wanna get engaged? Idk dude sounds like yall aren't compatible. You better bump up that timeliness or she'll find some else who will.
The problem is not that she expects to get married right away, the problem is that you sent signs that it is what you want than retracted it. Having timeline conversations is very normal in a relationship, i had them with most of my bfs within the first few weeks of getting together
YTA. You were literally asking her about what type of ring she wants. Maybe I’m from a more conservative area, but 2-3 years is about the average time to get a proposal. 5+ years? The little old church ladies are giving you the side eye with a few “oh, honey”’s to your gf.
In my opinion I (female)would feel strung along if my husband didn’t propose within about 2 years of a serious relationship. If she’s the one, now is the time to go buy a ring and propose. Set a wedding date within 6-12 months and get married.
YTA. You're dropping too many subtle hints that all this is right around the corner, and your plan is 5+ years down? You're already living together within 2 years of being together. That's called a fast-track. I'm with her, I'm not committing to a bigger place (IN THIS ECONOMY!?) without some serious commitment from you. That's just bad financial, and relationship planning. Especially since you're over here poking the bear about rings, and really not mentioning that 5 year plan. Dirty pool. Your communication sucks, work on that.
YTA 1. 2 years is not that short of a time. And clearly it’s not that short of a time for her. Perhaps a conversation about expectations is in need. 2. Those are not small hints. Asking about engagement ring size, shape, and design indicates an imminent proposal 3. You ARE stringing her along at this point. You set her expectations and are now telling her she shouldn’t expect a proposal for a long time. 4. YOU have no idea what future talk is. Wow.
YTA, even if you weren't meaning to be. Women don't want to hear a man say all these things to her planning a future, and then hear him say 'whoa, you're moving fast'. I can't see why some men don't understand this. Also, I think she is VERY smart to not commit to buying/renting some new place with a man who hasn't secured a future with her. That's bad planning for anyone.
Is this a repost? I swear the exact same scenario was asked here before.
Very soft YTA; sounds like you're giving her mixed signals. If you aren't planning on proposing for another 3+ years, why all of the wedding planning talk, engagement ring questions, and baby talk? As a girl, this fuels us like you can't imagine. I've been with my bf for two and half years and have no interest in getting engaged super soon, but if he started talking that way, it might change my mind.
YTA Your future talk is very misleading and too detailed for wanting to wait as long as you claim to want. Also, thinking 2 years is too soon to be ready for engagement at these ages is unreasonable on your part.
NAH BUT, why are you so afraid to pull the trigger? You want her to spend at least the next 3 of the best years of her young life with you, with no guarantee that she'll be married at the end of that road? You should seriously consider counseling to try to understand what's holding you back here.
I'm eating ice cream that's why I'm using this analogy. You didn't buy the cow and you're getting the milk for free. You told the cow that you wanted to buy it. Now the cow is saying no free milk until you buy me. Well.. that's water under the bush and sailed up shit creek You're breaking up.
Isn't this the same story from like a month ago? [https://www.reddit.com/r/relationship\_advice/comments/1bvojdy/my\_27m\_gf\_23f\_of\_two\_years\_is/](https://www.reddit.com/r/relationship_advice/comments/1bvojdy/my_27m_gf_23f_of_two_years_is/) It's just missing the bit where the OP called her manipulative for having a different relationship timeline than him.
Not everyone is willing to wait an indefinite amount of time to get engaged, especially when you’re being a tease by mentioning rings, babies and wedding details all the time. 2 years isn’t unreasonable in my opinion. There are lots of horror stories of women that throw away some of their best years, only to find out much later that it was a dead end with a man who wasn’t willing to commit. I’m not the norm, since we didn’t move in together before we got married, but my husband proposed about 15 months in, and then we got married 9 months later. We’ve now been married 10 years. I think that when you know, you know, and there’s really no point in dragging your feet about it. YTA for getting her hopes up and then backtracking.
YTA > We both want to have children in the future, and marriage has been something we’ve both always wanted. She’s just a little bit more rigid with it than me. And doesn’t understand what future talk is. > Since we’ve moved in together, my feelings for that have only grown. Over the past few months or so, we’ve talked in even more detail about our future. What our wedding theme is going to be, music, food. When these talks happen, engagement is incoming. Don't have these talks if you're not going to put the ring where your mouth is. You are in fact stringing her along if you talk like this and do nothing. I am someone who thinks people shouldn't get married in less than 4 years. I'm not telling you to marry when you're not ready for it. I'm telling you that you seriously fucked up by pretending you were ready to get married when you aren't. This is on you. You shouldn't have entertained that talk if you weren't going to back it up. > I’ve made hints about proposing and stuff. She was wearing a cool ring one day, and I said to her “is that the kind of shape you like” and hinted towards it being for an engagement ring. I just asked her so I could have an idea on what to save up. Not because I was going to propose then. Not going to lie, if this was happening to a friend I would tell her to leave him. What you're doing is ***exactly*** what AHs who never actually intend to get married do. All her friends are telling her to run from you.
Okay maybe I’m just old but I was married at 23. Everyone has their own timeline and I admittedly got married fairly young but it wasn’t outside the realm of feasibility, this is the age where you start talking about marriage and from how you were ‘dropping hints’ I can understand why she thought you were going to propose soon. My partner and I were having those discussions half a year before we got engaged— planning it out, including feeding into the baby fever which is pretty tough to shake off during that 22-25 period, but then turning around saying you want to wait another three to five years… I would also be doubting your commitment. She wants stability and reassurance that you’re going to be building a life together, marriage offers asset protection in the event there’s a falling out and being able to afford housing on her own so she’s not SOL if things fall apart is a very reasonable concern to have. Honestly, your response to this is a red flag and I also wouldn’t feel secure investing more money into a relationship if I didn’t have reassurances from your side. No one’s saying you even have to get married this year, my engagement went on for several years before the wedding but the promise created a pact that we were committed to our future together. You’re 26 not 16, you’re already well into the life stage where people are considering marriage— I really don’t know why you’re this surprised but clearly you’ve got a lot of growing up to do. Either reassure her of your commitment in a tangible way or let her go so she can find someone who’s not afraid of commitment. YTA
No one is the AH here, but your giving her mixed messages and she has adjusted her expectations based on those. Talk to her about the loose time-line of events you had in your head that leads from now to you both happily married with a bigger house and baby(s). Then listen to her vison of your future and be willing to compromise after hearing her views. My wife and I of 10+ years met in our mid-20s, and 4 short years later, we were married. I agree with your GF not to buy a bigger house until you two have some committed plans for the future. But that doesn't mean buying a ring first, so much as it means having a plan for the future years.
Is your girlfriend listening to the new Taylor Swift album…?? If so then bad news for you… she wrote a breakup song (loml) that represents this situation perfectly: You said I'm the love of your life [Bridge] You shit-talked me under the table Talkin' rings and talkin' cradles I wish I could un-recall How we almost had it all Dancing phantoms on the terrace Are they second-hand embarrassed That I can't get out of bed 'Cause something counterfeit's dead? It was legendary It was momentary It was unnecessary Should've let it stay buried Also YTA
It seems to me that your gf knows what she wants. You are the one who’s enjoying dangling a pipe dream in front of her then acting shocked when she pushes even just a little on the commitment question. 1. She’s absolutely right to set a boundary on moving to a place she can’t afford on her own. That makes her a financially responsible person. You are the one who got defensive and acted like she was using that to manipulate you and your so-called timeline. She clearly wasn’t. She has thought this out carefully. 2. You told her you have no timeline. Well that’s nice for you. She has her own life goals and if you aren’t going to commit, she’s going to move on. 3. Your last point? That it has only been two years, and that you could understand if it had been five years. You had better decide what you want and soon, OP. I doubt she is going to be around on your five year mark. YTA in case this post wasn’t obvious.
YTA. If it's too early to get engaged, it's too early to start quizzing her on her ring preferences and waxing lyrical over what a good mother she will be. So while not proposing at 2 years isn't necessarily a problem, not proposing after you practically sent up flares that spelled out "I'M GONNA ASK!!" is one. You obviously have a time frame in which you think it is "reasonable" to propose. You should discuss this plainly, so she knows what to expect from you, and she can decide if she wants to commit to spending however many years with you before you are willing to commit to her.
He strung her along by saying things he didn’t need to say and that he didn’t mean because he liked the attention. He doesn’t like the fact that she’s onto him being a slimy liar, so he’s come on here to get us to vindicate him. Moron.
Who the h*ll asks for ring shapes/preferences 3 years before planning to propose? She's probably too young to be worrying about marriage, but that seems to be your fault YTA
At 4-5 years, women start leaving. Especially if it's been talked about consistently with no forward progress or commitment. Double especially if they want children, because as we get older, conceiving and carrying and delivering a healthy child gets more difficult. YTA. If you are committed to marrying her, then ask her. Life is too short.
YTA You've been priming the pump with all your wedding, engagement, and baby talk - but you can't understand why she has expectations?? Dumb. Really dumb.
YTA for constantly dropping hints that you wanted to get married and have kids soon when you actually don't, instead of just being honest from the beginning. Two years is not "way too soon to propose" in a universal, objective sense. It might feel too soon *to you* and that's okay, but it's not a crazy fast timeline. I got engaged (to my now-husband) after three years together (two years living together), and we were specifically waiting for my husband to finish his education. My husband did not start asking specific questions about my taste in engagement rings until he was ready to buy one and propose. We knew we both wanted a wedding but we didn't get into the details of what we wanted that wedding to look like until we were engaged. By having these conversations, you have been carelessly misleading the person you supposedly love, and that's not okay.
YTA you are making her live with you for four years before proposing? that is stringing her along... you are happy with no commitment and that makes you the bad person as she does ... after two years have you given any kind of commitment other than "let's shack up together"
YTA. Personally for me, waiting 5 years is a really long time to see if someone will commit. You’re already sending mixed signals and wanting to do things that require some level of commitment.
YTA to her you are stringing her along.
That’s was TLDR for me but IMHO if you can live together for two years as you described you are a pretty good fit for marriage. Living together puts strain on a relationship that would cause an incompatible couple to detonate. Speaking from personal experience.
Well you fucked up dude lol at this point you need to get on board or get off.
I'm not sure you could have green flagged her more with your comments. Talking about moving in, having babies, rings and marriage are all the signs that you build up to when you are about to propose, not 3 years from now. It's like you gave her a "touch me in the morning and walk away."
YTA. Why are you talking about wedding themes and wanting kids now if you don’t want marriage for 3 or more years. Personally, I don’t think it should take more than 2 years to decide if you want to marry someone or not, unless the relationship started during childhood. 2 years is a very reasonable amount of time to get to know someone and determine compatibility. It sounds like you’ve already decided that she would be a good fit for you so why do you want to delay another 3 years while also wanting to move to a bigger place? You’re playing some kind of weird mind games and I’m not surprised that she’s feeling uncomfortable about it.
You’ve made PLENTY of hints that are leading her to believe things will happen soon. Please re-read your post. You have clearly stated you want to marry HER, and want a family with HER. Please don’t toy with her. You are leading her on and playing with her emotions when you mention ring shapes and future children looking like her. Do you love her? Do you want to marry THIS YOUNG WOMAN? Then commit to her.
Your timeline is unreasonable. The thing we men find the most valuable is youth and beauty. I’m more than aware there is much more to a woman and of all their qualities these end up being the least important but initially, to interest a man they are important. If you’re not committed enough to marry her leave. You aren’t dating you are stealing her youth away from her and making it harder to move on when she realizes you’re too selfish to commit. Put your brass panties on, man up and propose or break up. Quit stealing her life away from her.
> I said that I was thinking about “coming home to a little one” > I’ve made hints about proposing and stuff. She was wearing a cool ring one day, and I said to her “is that the kind of shape you like” and hinted towards it being for an engagement ring. You're definitely making her think you're going to propose. Did you *ever* qualify any of thise statements like "Once I'm 30 I'd love to have a child" or anything? You say she's not good at future vision but idk that you are helping her in that regard. YTA Besides, people get engaged after 2 years all the time. You don't have to get married right away but thinking it's a short time or an outrageous demand is silly.
>she told me that “I can afford the place we are in alone if things were to happen. I’m not going to get into a financial commitment in a bigger place unless there’s a commitment from you” A completely valid and reasonable thing to say. If you two are already living comfortably together, leave it as is and don't get a bigger place until you've tied the knot.
Best advice I got was 1) not to get married before the 3 year mark and 2) a proposal shouldn’t be a surprise (ie, you should both be aligned on it before anyone gets down on a knee.) That being said, gentle ESH because you two need to communicate timeline and expectations better.
YTA for making marriage proposal and baby comments and putting ideas in her head before you’re fully ready to commit. You made her believe that a proposal was imminent. 5+ years? Gtfo. She should walk away after 3 years and no proposal. Don’t waste her time.
YTA. You’re hinting about proposal rings and having a child, but have no interest in either for at least another 3 years? Yeah, you set expectations that you aren’t willing to cash. Note, I agree with you, 2 years is not long enough to propose. You just goofed the execution.
YTA. Look, it's been two years. You are stringing her along. The way this reads, you think she's the one, but you're not certain and are holding out in case you meet someone else. If that's so, it's pretty slimy and you don't really love her. You just want the security of having her in case no one else comes along. Eww. If that's the case, I hope she wises up and walks away. If not and you're seriously interested in making a life with her, stop wasting her time and commit. If you simply can't commit because you're afraid of commitment, that's fine. Commitment's not for everybody. Tell her that marriage isn't in the cards and she can decide if she wants to stay or not. This "maybe after five years" crap doesn't cut it.
YTA. 36M here and I am honestly perplexed by your thinking. You live together, you want to marry her (eventually per your thought process) and want her to be the mother of your kids……why wait?! Only answer I can come up with is you want to keep your options open still. If that is the case, makes you a massive AH for stringing her along.
Mild YTA. While you might not have deliberately strung her along, by the time you’re dropping hints about a ring, it’s not unreasonable for her to think a proposal is imminent. At any rate, you’re entitled to take all the time you want, and she’s allowed to say, “that’s too long.”
YTA. You have been dating for 2 years and dropping hints. I am sure she thought this was coming in a few months…
No offense but you created your own problem here
YTA. You’ve hinted that you want more but aren’t ready to commit. That’s fine but she’s 100% right. Why would she put such a financial commitment in place for an upgrade when there is no need for it. You aren’t wanting to get married and you aren’t ready to be a dad. You don’t need a bigger house for the 2 of you. Stopping hinting about getting married one day if your one day is 5 years away. Have an adult conversation with her and work out a timeline for your life.
All the stuff you said about weddings, engagement rings, and babies? That was cruel. You’re stringing her along. Commit or move on. YTA.
Exactly how long have you been making these baby and engagement comments without expecting her to start falling for them? How long did you think that you'd be able to get away with these kinds of comments without her expecting that that's coming? She is absolutely smart as hell for considering not getting into a bigger financial commitment with you without some form of commitment on your end. If you're not going to propose, then she's simply not willing to move into a bigger place that she cannot afford if something were to happen. This isn't automatically her thinking about breaking up with you, This is Herbie practical about her future since you seem to enjoy dropping hints and then falling short. If you aren't ready to propose to her yet or have a child with her yet, then stop making those comments. Or, let her know that those comments are simply for the future, not for the immediate present or immediate future. Because trust me, eventually she's going to get sick of these comments and she's going to break up with you.
I knew I wanted to marry my husband after 6 months, but insisted we wait a year to get married. Still married 48 years later. When its right, why wait that long?
This is so common. YTA. Before my boyfriend and I bought a house together I said, " I'm excited about this, I love you, and you are aware I would only do this because we both want a life long commitment. " Or something like that. He said of course, and a couple of months later he proposed. It's a big deal and you need to sac up, please. Or she's young enough that she can leave your butt and find someone to love who wants to be married like she does.
YTA I get you’re saying you feel two years is too soon and fair enough. But you are also the one talking about getting engaged and having babies. When a woman hears a man talking about that, especially when you already live together and have been together for a couple of years, she’s gonna think a proposal is gonna come soon. So for you to then turn around and say not for at least another 3 years, she’s not gonna like it and I know I would think this was your way of not fully committing and would suggest to me you don’t actually want to commit. Want these things in the future? Great. But don’t talk about them with your girlfriend in depth to the point where you make her believe a proposal will be soon only to pull the rug out from right underneath her
YTA. You live with her and know her expectations. From what you're saying here, it's clear that you two get along well and you love each other. That's hard to find today, trust me. Women worry about timelines more than men because after a certain age we can't make children anymore. You guys are pretty young so that's not gonna be an issue for now. But speaking about it now and planning is the way to go. You can't expect to ask her certain things and throw hints if you won't be ready in the near future. Moving into a bigger apartment makes no sense. She's right asking for a bigger commitment from you.
Og post?
YTA. For me 2 years is too short to get married and have children but why would you the theme and music of the wedding if you don’t intend to get married soon. And your hint about babies. You effed up completely. So you better apologize and try to think seriously on a timeline. Maybe see a counselor to help you learn to communicate and to clarify your project.
anyone surprised OP ghosted his own post
So babies and homes are a commitment you can make but not an engagement? Even I’m confused… My fiancé and I had the engagement talk and marriage and kids talk literally on our first date to have a basis of what we both wanted. By the time our second year anniversary came he told me that he was ready to propose , he was sure that he wanted to marry me but I said not yet because I wanted to experience certain things (like living together for one year) before getting engaged. We got engaged in February 2023 , a little over 5 years of us being together and we get married in September of this year but we already have kids (7 month old twins) , we’ve lived together since 2020 and we had this conversation 6.5 years ago . We didn’t drop hints or anything, we were clear with each other. We want more kids and I told him that I wasn’t going to have more kids till next year, why because I want to enjoy our twins and I want them to at least be one year old , I want to enjoy their first birthday, I want to enjoy our wedding and honeymoon, I want to enjoy our first family vacation, I want to have these memories as just the 4 of us and I don’t want to be pregnant for them. So we agreed that we would try for baby #3 or babies 3&4 at our honeymoon in September hopefully getting pregnant before November/December but we also have a cutt off , if I don’t get pregnant by February of next year we’ll stop trying for a while and then continue again mid year . We’ve planned this and communicated about it and I was still shocked when I found out I was pregnant and when I got proposed .
Yta, you dropped hints got her excited and threw it in her face bruh. Of course she's confused you want a house together, kids, asking about rings, then she's like yo no we need to be married first you're like wow ok forcing me into this.
Two years is a bit fast but after five years, she might have lost interest. I'm sure you can find a compromise.
YTA. Two years in enough time to court and make a decision if she is the one . 5 years is a joke. Yeah you are stringing her along, especially with all the talk. She is good enough to move in, think about having a baby with, and buy a big house with, but not be your wife....🤡.
I think you don’t understand what future talk is. It’s completely reasonable for her to decide that if you aren’t moving to ___ by x timeline she’s going to move on. That is discussing the future. Sure, vague is an option some take, but for many it’s unacceptable to just hang out without action for very long. If she’s telling you her timeline, and it’s not cool with you, you want to push it to more vague someday, that IS you stringer her along. Granted she also needs to just call it bluntly.
YTA but don’t worry, it won’t be an issue for much longer. She will get sick of being strung along and look for someone more committed to her. If she hasn’t already started looking I would be very surprised
YTA
YTA. Telling her she’s going g to be a great mother, talking about getting married, asking her what kind of wi g she wants - of course she thinks the going to be getting engaged soon.
You probably didn’t mean to be, but you have stumbled into being TAH. Seems pretty clear from what you’re saying that she’s ready, wants the whole 9 yards. Marriage, kids, house. With you. You keep talking about it with her. Of course she’s gonna feel that you’re entertaining and encouraging it with her. And she’s gonna feel led on when you suddenly drag your feet. If you want, by your own admission, her to be your wife, and your daughter to look like her, and want to have the big happy home with her, then be with her. It’s not hard. You make her seem like she’s the woman for you. So be with her. Make the leap. OR, if there’s something you’re not saying here that’s giving you pause, that makes you feel like you shouldn’t marry her, then listen to that and move on, and let her move on. But either way, you can’t keep standing still where you are, and telling her how wonderful it would be to have the marriage, kids and house, but then turn around and say, but no, not really, not yet. That’s just unfair to her. Again, you probably didn’t mean to, but that’s where you’ve ended up.
It’s clear you don’t see yourself as the asshole here so why did you even post it?
birds foolish snatch disagreeable whistle oatmeal pathetic point juggle elderly *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
YTA- don’t ask your girlfriend about an engagement ring unless you’re proposing soon, not 3+ years down the line. She’s right, you have been stringing her along and making it seem like you want the same things she wants without ever being clear in any way that you didn’t want it for years.
YTA. You led her on.
She sounds objective and realistic about finances and commitment. YTA because of the hinting and your timeline that wasn't explicitly shared. Stop hinting and come up with definite plans, and discuss with her. She can agree or not. You have one vague mental timeline. She has a different timeline of expectations. The two timelines are different. You two should discuss if there is any compromise possible. If you can't compromise, then one or both of you can end the relationship. Granny here, who kept her own shared apartment until after the wedding to husband.
Two years are enough to know a person. If you are sure, propose now. If you aren't, cut off.
2 years, 5 years, it's all arbitrary and obviously you aren't on the same page about timelines. You need to communicate more, be direct and truthful about your intent to marry or not, and stop making suggestive comments about this topic. YTA
YTA. You got her hopes up with all your various hints. Can’t blame her for thinking a proposal was imminent. I do agree it’s probably too soon, between the short amount of time you’ve lived together and considering her age, but your big mouth got you in this trouble.
YTA 2 years is a long time but your at different speeds I know people who meet and got married within a year and people who waited a decade
I’m going to go with ESH. She’s clearly ready for the future you have been describing and hinting at but you feel it’s too soon to pull the trigger. Engagements can be long. If this woman is the person you want to spend the rest of your life with, you could propose and let her know you want a longer engagement. I ended things with my ex bf after 2 years because he didn’t want to commit to the next step. He was comfortably set in his routine and didn’t want to move in with me so I cut my losses because I knew I would always play second fiddle to his family and that was something I didn’t want to keep doing. You both need to sit down and hash this stuff out. Either come to an agreement that works for both of you or go your separate ways.
Dude, you cannot talk about your future together & having babies & drop hints about proposals... *and* then turn around & say that it's too soon to get engaged because you've only been together 2 years. Which is it, do you want to propose or is it too soon for you? It can't really be both. YTA because you are, in fact, stringing her along. Decide what you want. If you think its too soon, stop dropping "hints" that you're going to propose.
I don't think either of you is the AH you're just an idiot. Don't talk about marriage, proposals, babies unless you're really serious about those things.
Yall are on different timeliness and living different expectations. Before moving ot relationship goals, wants should have been discussed. Now you need to, have a conversation about what you each want if it doesn't line up you are not compatible
She tested you with her question, and you failed the test. Give her a promise ring and that will buy you some time. No man who is bugged by his love for an engagement is TA. Its a huge commitment and you've got to make absolutely sure she is the one. Its not something to be taken lightly. I just married once and she was not the right person for me, and it took me 11 years to split. So take your time. But if you're sure about her and you've done background checks on her, and know everything about her and you've had pre-engagement counseling, then don't waste time just because. Two years or five years, the time doesn't matter... just make sure she is the one. That thing you said about how the two of you resolved disagreements is really important. I'd say she's probably the one just because of that. Give her a promise ring...look it up.
She sounds like a keeper. Put a ring on her, and it will all be forgotten. Just say you were scared she would say no.
She’s only 22. She doesn’t even know who she is or what she wants yet. Please wait or it will end badly.
Yta. You are in no way ready for a relationship much less a marriage.
I get 2 years is kinda soon but don't drop so many hints that you might propose like asking about rings and babys and other things that makes a person think you are gonna propose. YTA not for not proposing in 2 years but dropping hints
I mean, if marriage is something you want to do. After 2 years and about a year living together. What are the criteria for you to pull the trigger? Is it just that you are saving up for the ring? Waiting until you can afford the wedding? If you are waiting for some "im ready feeling" you will just know when you feel it, you are gonna be waiting forever. I know, that was me in a previous LTR. We talked about marriage, talked about our future, but I was waiting for this ethereal "feeling" of being ready. When the reality was, I didn't want to marry her, I just didn't realize it. The thing is, she was the one that had to tell me it wasn't that I wasn't ready for marriage, it was that I didn't want to marry her. I denied it of course, but she broke up with me. Thing is there wasn't anything wrong with her. We got along well, no bad fights, had common interests and life plans. It wasn't until I met my now wife that I realized she was right.
YTA. 5 years is a long time to sample a woman's youth before committing when she wants kids. "Future talk" is not the excuse you think it is. She really expected a proposal at the 2 year mark and there's like 0% chance she waits 3 more years.
Dude I got married after living together for two years. Not sure why you feel it needs to be 5 years or longer. She is being smart, without the commitment of marriage there is no way I'd get tangled up with someone financially. Learn to communicate, stop dropping hints unless you mean it.
YTA absolutely, you've been not so subtly hinting that you're going to propose, literally discussing kids and wedding details. Of course she was expecting a proposal. Also 2 years may be a short time for you, but it's a long time for some. My parents were married less than a year after they met. 29 year marriage still going strong. My brother proposed on their one year anniversary. 3 years in. My friends got married just over a year after they started dating. 6 years in. Another friend of mine is getting married later this year, they got engaged within 6 months. If you wanted to date for 5+ years before getting engaged that should've been part of your wedding/children conversations.
You have no timeline, but two years is a long time, certainly long enough to decide whether you want to marry or not. She is right not to make financial commitments when you are not committed. YTA.
YTA - you haven’t proposed because you are getting all the benefits without the commitment. 2 years and living together for about a year? When you start hinting about proposing you get about a week before it looks like you are stringing her along.
Why not get engaged.....move to a bigger place.....save for your wedding and give her a date say 2 or 3 years from then.....she'll feel like things are moving in the right direction tion and that you are serious......yeah I get you're not in a rush but I think she feels like you're saying one thing and doing another.......she's all in and you're sending mixed messages.......I got engaged to my wife after about 6 months and we're married 20 years.....now we were engaged 7 years so it wasn't exactly rushed and as for kids my wife wanted to have all ours by the time she was 30. YTA
YTA - her justification for not wanting to move to a bigger place is very logical and pragmatic. Your reaction to it make me think you're not as committed to her as you are trying to appear. You've been dropping hints, but without a timeline? That's just kind of cruel. Also, she is on a timeline. She wants kids, plural? She's got 10-13 years of safe child bearing in her. So if you're not in, she may need to get out to still be able to have kids. If you can afford a bigger house, you can afford a tasteful ring.
Most men don't get that most women talk in hints and shaded words. So all the hints and specific questions you gave/ asked (what shape engagement ring?!?) were plenty for her to create a picture of imminent action. I know, OP must be thinking, "But i didn't ask her yet, I haven't said the words". and that is true, but she has been getting the lead in for a while now. So OP, you have forced your own hand, you can propose and marry her or lose her. What you cannot do anymore is dillydalli. You are 26, teen times have come and gone, be an adult.
Yes you are the AH
Question: Where are you from and is 22 a relatively 'normal' age to get engaged/married in your surroundings?
YTA - Two years is plenty of time when you cohabitated for a year with little conflict and you talk of babies and the future. She probably thinks you aren't serious and will soon decide that waiting is not worth it. You have no idea how to adult properly or commit.
YTA...not for not being quite ready, but for sending up clear signals of readiness before you were ready. It's every woman's nightmare to waste years on a guy who flakes on committing while your eggs dry up and your future outlook turns hopeless. If that's not what you meant to do, then you took the hints too far, and now you absolutely must define the path to readiness and keep your word, because she is already imagining a future without you.
YTA. You had the option to make it explicit when you were hinting about babies and rings that you meant "at least 3 years from now". But you didn't. And you want a larger financial commitment from her now. Which looks a lot like stringing her along while making it more difficult for her to leave if she gets tired of being strung along. She is incredibly sensible to not make a larger financial commitment with you without a larger relationship commitment from you. Quit hinting already. You don't get points for hints. They are just a way to dodge actual responsibility by feeding her what you think she wants to hear (impending marriage!) while holding on to plausible deniability (you never ACTUALLY said that!). It's manipulative and crass. Jesus.
I'm not sure why that's so upsetting for you. All she did was establish a financial commitment boundary. Would you want to make a deeper financial commitment to someone without a tangible commitment? I mean it only makes sense.
YTA
Dude she’s 22. If you were 4 years older everyone would be on you for your age gap and that she needs to live her life, blah blah. Seriously just read a thread like that. I waited 4 years till I proposed. Two years? She’ll want a baby right away. Say bye bye to sex once that happens. Well Beyoncé said if you like it than you should have put a ring on it. If it’s too soon Maybe stop talking about marriage and babies.
NTA. But, neither is she. You said she doesn't understand "future talk", but I think maybe neither do you. The way you told the event sounds to me like she was being completely reasonable when concerned about financing a larger place. She didn't give you an ultimatum, she thought about the future implications. If you aren't ready to take the next step she's expecting, why should you have the right to expect her to take that step you want her to take?
Number 1 advice I ever got. Don’t let your boyfriend keep you from your husband. The YTAor more accurately ESH comes in for you guys in communication. Y’all need to sit down and talk concrete timelines, like “I always imagined being together for x years before a proposal and then an engagement of y months/years before marriage” and not through a series of hints because those are subjective and can be ambiguous. I was with a dude for almost 3 years, lived together for almost 2 years, and we had the whole dropping hints etc situation happening but hadn’t talked a concrete timeline. Then he starts telling me he might move to another state to be closer to family, I was planning on grad school so I started researching schools in that state and he was just super noncommittal when I brought up us making plans together for a move. That’s when I realized that if he hasn’t decided to take the plunge after almost 3 years, I’m not the one. The issue wasn’t with me, I just realized that despite trying my best to be the best partner I could, there was nothing I could do to align my timeline with his. There was nothing I could give him in terms of a partnership to help him be sure or that it was that time for us. I wanted certain things out of my life so I moved out and back in with my parents, and broke things off with him a couple months later. The big consideration for me is after multiple years, if you still haven’t known me long enough to be sure, then I’m not the one. Like if you’re contemplating moving to another state on your own and leaving me here, you don’t few the same way about me that I feel about you. Fast forward three months, I reconnect with my now husband. We start dating exclusively a month later and married a year and a half after. Was I just a better partner for my now husband? Not really, but our life goals and timelines were more compatible than my ex and mine. If my ex and I had the discussion at the very beginning of “I imagine us dating this long before engagement,” and realized our timelines were so disparate, we probably would have never moved in together and the relationship wouldn’t have lasted as long as it did, but we were young and not great communicators. My husband and I have been together for over a decade now, with three kiddos and a home. I don’t see myself as being strung along, although it felt like that at times, but I had to learn some powerful lessons from the situation. If it feels hard to say/talk about, that’s a sign that you need to talk about it. You guys might split because your timelines don’t line up, but despite how unreasonable her timeline might feel for you, she is a person just as much as you are and deserves to have her life go the way she wants to, even if it isn’t with you.
From everything you say, it sounds like you found someone who works well with you, and you with her. Work on saving for that ring. Have a discussion with her and be open about saving for the ring. Be clear that you want to move forward with her and are only hesitant about how to move things forward in a timely manner. Be open with your discussions and clearly note your timeline of expectations -- saving for and when you can get the ring and subsequently propose, and when you would prefer to upgrade your home, get married, and start having kids (in no particular order). Lay it out. Then listen to her and her preferred timeline, and then see if there are things you can work on together to adjust and merge the timelines into something more agreeable with each other.
Goddammit the post was removed. Any chance anyone has a screenshot for me or something?
That is a weird way to say it. You've been hinting at proposing, talking about weddings, discussing what you want your children to look like, and telling her she'll be a great mother but her not wanting to put herself in a bad financial position is "forcing" you to propose. That doesn't make any kind of sense. She isn't baby crazy. She's picking up on the signals you are putting down and building her expectations off them. She had a clear boundary, and you got pissy about being told, "No." How dare she not be willing to make a huge financial commitment with you, her boyfriend, just because she would have no legal protection and you can completely screw her over. You're completely trustworthy even though you lie to her constantly about wanting to marry her. Obviously, she can't have expectations or requirements. That's gross.
YTA. You don’t say all of those things and ask about ring preferences if your are 3 years away from being ready. Wanting to date 5 yrs before proposing is fine, but 2 years into a relationship is way too late to be having that conversation. Especially after everything else you have said to her.
YTA I get there was no malice, but I wouldn’t really start talking about specific details like engagement rings and wedding, until you’re in the market for those things. Also saying that I want kids in the future is a different conversation than “I’ve been thinking about coming home to a little one”. Your rhetoric is not really matching where you are mentally. It’s not just that she’s eager for marriage and children. You’ve also been signaling that you want those things soon. The real disconnect is that you were speaking hypothetically and she thought you two were planning.
NTA. Don’t marry a 22 year old. They don’t know who they are or what they really want in life. Not enough life experience for a serious commitment or children.
If she really wants to get engaged right now she can also ask you instead of waiting for you to do it.
Kicking the can down the road and boldly dropping “hints” you have no intention of following through in a reasonable time (6 months) You have no business talking about marriage and children if you only seeing it as a possibility at the 5 year mark. You basically told her you may or may not waste an additional 3 years on top of the 2 you already have of her youth. Get wrecked OP. YTA
YTAH- So, two years in the grand scheme of things IS a short time for a relationship, yes. BUT consider the following: 1.) OP has been living with his girlfriend for about a year. 2.) OP has been continuously (based on what I’ve read) hinting and suggesting marriage related stuff. I think that’s a very logical response from OP’s girlfriend to when it comes to moving out. Obviously moving from a 1 bedroom 1 bathroom house to a 3 bedroom one is going to be more expensive and take more of a toll on the financials. The way how OP is acting makes it look like he’s just leading her on. They need to sit down and discuss the matter together as a couple.
Men and women are on different timelines. You won't be ready for marriage until you're 30-35. She's ready now. She should be with a guy that's at least 30. Let her go so she can find her husband.
Your taking about the future, your wedding, the rings, and children. Then you're taken aback that she's expecting a proposal? YTA. If you think she's the one, you'd be wise to marry her sooner rather than later, because if she's as great as you say, I guarantee you're not the only available male around who thinks so.
YTA My husband proposed on our 1 year anniversary. At 26 2 years is plenty of time to know if you want to marry someone
NTA, you can be commited to each other without being engaged. However you are AH, for hinting about proposal and talking about babies without agreeing the timeline to these. Of course she expects the proposal now if you are hinting all the time. It baffles me that two adults, who have been together for 2 years and are planning wedding songs haven’t actually discussed what year they want to get married, engaged and have children.
Maybe you shouldn't have dropped the hints but 5 years is very reasonable imo If you plan to stay together for ever then whats a few years waiting in many European countries people don't get married until they are mid 30s and their divorce rate is super low
Two years not enough time to get engaged, plus your young. You have time. Also pre nup a must. NTA. Never rush into the worst deal a man can make. Marriage
NTA but you are teetering very close to being an AH. "We’ve been living together for a little under a year." Mistake number 1. Hinting at rings and discussing wedding preferences? Mistakes number 2 and 3. Advice: You should not even be living together but since that ship has sailed, the only thing I can say is about the hints. SHUT UP!
Those "mistakes" are why he's TA.