Whats stopping you from starting your life together now?

Lots of people don't live together before they get married, whether for religious reasons or reasons of personal preference. Other couples like my FI and I choose to wait for marriage for sex. But there are other reasons too, including having children, putting your spouse on your insurance, etc. Moving with someone before marriage isn't always the best idea. For military couples as well, a lot of benefits aren't conferred to unmarried partners.

I have always wondered the same thing! My fiancé and I already have a life together. We have an apartment, a dog, and each other. We get to be with each other and enjoy life just the same until our wedding day so there's really nothing that magically changes for us!

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Thats how we are, besides a dog ): ,
everyone is asking how I can wait almost 3 years to get married, and I'm just like Idk We've been dating 10, whats another 3 years when youre spending forever together?

I’ve wondered this too! My fiancé and I have friends who got married just a few months after being engaged so they could “start their lives together”. Mind you they already lived together.


We have been together for almost ten years and already started our lives together early on. We lived together, traveled, paid bills together, have a dog together. Not sure where starting your life together truly “starts”. We can’t wait to married and have children but that’s not where it starts. It’s starts MUCH earlier than that.

For us, we definitely already have a life together, but we're starting a life together as an official family. It means having children since we don't want to have any until we're married. We'd start trying almost right after we get married. In turn, I want to be able to share the same last name of the person I'm with and future child. "Starting our lives together" for us means finally putting wedding planning and wedding finances behind us and buying a house as a married couple.

As far as planning our "perfect" wedding, honestly, a few months ago we got to a point where outside of immediate family, we don't really care who is at our wedding and would rather save the money for something else, so we didn't mind cutting our guest list at all. Our idea of a perfect wedding completely changed when covid hit.

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I forgot about that too- getting married before orders are cut make it a lot easier to be on the travel orders. And insurance, BAH, etc, require marriage.

For myself, we’ve been together 14 years, live together , and now work from home together. We’ve certainly started our lives but I was in a doctoral program, he had several businesses etc and the timing wasn’t right for marriage back then. We’ve also delayed children to focus on our career goals. We’re open to starting to try now. But if I’ve used that phrasing in the past it’s likely related to children and buying a house.

View Quoted Comment Yes! THIS. Your life with your partner starts way before living together, being married or having children

I’m thinking a lot of it may have to do with children, moving in together (if people still wait for that???) and possible insurance purposes.


For me, we may post pone our original plan until late 2022 but getting married soon for insurance reasons. My fiancé has been in and out of work for the past year because of COVID-19 so his insurance runs out by a specific date. Luckily, I’ve been working and have good insurance. We also planned to try for kids a little after the wedding so if we postpone 18 months past our original date, we may try for kids now and then still go forward with the planned party the way we want next year. Our venue has no late 2021 dates, only summer 2022 or later right now but we have to wait to choose a date. We already live together 3 years so we technically started our lives together, just may change our plans to what fits us best (aka, traditional is out the window now a days😅).
Your question is fair for sure. I’m curious as to what some couples are doing/ considering “starting their lives together” too.

View Quoted Comment Thanks for sharing your opinion. I researched and many sources didn't put an actual mile distance. Again, as stated some ppl wouldn't consider 100 miles long distance. I lnow several collegues before COVID who would commute that distance each day for work lol.

I was lucky enough to get married pre-covid so I’m not actually in this situation, but I do understand the desire to want to get married and “start your lives” together over having the big wedding. I mean even pre-covid this was always relevant for some people, based on finances etc. that it’s either you have a small/simple wedding now, or an extravagant wedding later. It just depends what your priorities are, I guess. I know for a fact that if our wedding had been scheduled during Covid, we would’ve just cancelled the big wedding and eloped in the backyard with my few local relatives. Maybe done a vow renewal in a few years. To me, the “wedding” itself always really felt like a bonus. It was the marriage part I wanted to get to. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVED our wedding. But I certainly wouldn’t have delayed being married to my husband for anything. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with prioritizing the wedding and delaying it, if that’s important to you! It really just depends what different people feel is more important... the marriage being timely, or the wedding being traditional 🤷🏻‍♀️

We got married a year before covid hit, so I’m not a covid bride. But, I did sacrifice my dream wedding due to finances. To me it was more important to be married than have a dream wedding.
(It would have taken at least another year to save which would have put us smack in the middle of covid and we would have had to postpone. That would have been 3+ years engaged. I would not be ok with that)

From a religious stand point being married was Important. I always wanted to be married before kids. Also to me buying a home together it was important to be married first. I owned my home and if I sold before we were married and then broke up I’d loose all the profits from my house. Financially I also felt more secure after we got married even though we opened a joint account after getting engaged. His supporting me when needed and him supporting me as a team. To me being married started a whole new chapter of our lives that was just more “official” in a societal aspect and a personal aspect. Yes we had a life together but now that we are married we are a unit. It’s different. It’s different in support, decision making, goals etc. all decisions 100% effect both of us in a way that they didn’t before being married.

I’m 34 now and would like to have children soon. While some people will have a child and then the big reception later, I want to keep the traditional part of being married first.
And because I’m in my 30’s, I still look young and in good shape. I spent almost $4k on my dress so I’m gonna wear and look good in it like a model, with professional pictures to last forever. I can’t guarantee that I’ll be in the shape that I am now if I postpone another year, especially since metabolism slows with age.
If I was still in my 20’s then postponing would seriously be considered.

I have always wondered how this topic is viewed from people who already live together vs. people who are waiting until marriage to live together. I know as a guest, I am always more emotional at a wedding when the couple is coming to marry and live together for the first time vs. a couple who has already been living together. Showers /weddings were used in the past to celebrate a couple coming together and joining households and providing gifts to support that (bedding, towels, dishes, etc.) and now most registries state no gifts are needed because couple has everything yet money is suggested and will help support "honeymoon" even though couple started lives together years ago and have had multiple trips away together. I truly don't understand the point in having a big wedding (vs elopement or small family/close friends affair) when couples have already been living in union (financially, socially, emotionally,sexually) beforehand.

While I dislike the phrasing, as well, there are a lot of legal and medical implications to being married that are very different to not-married.

I had a terrible bout of pneumonia before DH even moved in with me - I was hospitalized for 5 days. Because we had no *legal* relationship, he was not allowed to make medical decisions for me, medical workers had to ask me permission to even talk in front of him, and if I'd become unable to make my own decisions, my mother would have been the one calling the shots (YIKES).

IMMEDIATELY after I recovered, we printed out a document that DH *kept in a special folder* that authorized him to make medical decisions for me. (Had to be signed by multiple witnesses and everything. Thankfully, I have friends who all but fought over who got to do that signing.)

Now, when I have to go to the doctor, even with COVID protocols, I can just video chat him in, so he can hear if I need him to. (I have. A lot.)

There's a lot more weight to DH saying, "Hey, my WIFE..." if he needs something from work, or more precautions at a doctor's appointment, not to mention he can actually put me on his insurance without a penalty.

And so on.

So, while our life together began when we started dating... moving *forward* is a lot easier with a little piece of paper.

Bureaucracy, so much fun! ...No.

View Quoted Comment We want a "big wedding" (less than 100 people) simply to party and celebrate with our friends and family. I didn't even think people might be marrying straight out of their parents house. That's crazy!

If anything, I think people who have lived together prior to marriage deserve the big celebration the most! Rather than committing to each other while living separately and still in the “honeymoon phase”, the couples who are already living together have taken that next step, and have gone through the trials and tribulations of living together, and have put in the work to overcome them, and haven still choose to commit to one another. Knowing that you can work through things together, and that you still want to commit to a lifetime with your partner even after knowing what it’s like cohabitating with them (because, let’s be honest, things get real when you live together) says to me that those couples know what they are getting into and are committed for the long-haul; whereas committing to someone prior to living with them (before knowing whether or not they are compatible, possibly seeing the reality of who that person is and just what living with them entails and how it dramatically changes the relationship), means that person could end up in a very unfavorable living condition/relationship, but stick around because they are now legally bound to one another and it’s much more difficult to leave. I think living together and having put in the work to become a healthy, committed couple deserves celebrating for sure!

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I feel the same way for the most part. It's also probably best to be living out of a parents house prior to moving in together. Living by myself was easy. Moving in with my SO, I honestly thought about ending the relationship. I was so stressed from cleaning up and taking care of two people. I couldn't imagine having the stress of starting a marriage, and immediately after being forced into a new routine of life.

With that said, we do want to buy a house soon, lets hope the housing market changes in our favor, so that will be fun stress while wedding planning.

I agree with you it sounds weird. My FH and I officially got engaged in October. We have been together for 3 years and have lived together nearly as long. I have an almost 9 yr old son from a previous marriage and my FH and I have a two yr old daughter. We talked about holding off on getting married for another year but he doesn't want to wait that long. So since we have to have a smaller wedding, we plan on doing another wedding later. We want to move across country soon so waiting on getting married just doesn't make sense. My FH have already started a life together, we want to finally be able to celebrate it with our families 😊

It could potentially be a red flag; it could also be like what everyone else is saying: Religious/traditional purposes/poor wording; but one thing I didn’t see suggested, is a potential red flag. Now it may not be the case in most instances; however it could be an indication that the op is well...potentially not engaged and trying to seem like it to their friends and family, or is the abuser in the relationship and is controlling every aspect of the fiancé’s life to push for the marriage. (Money in marriage and more money in divorce for a free meal ticket) Unfortunately it really does happen. But because I’ve seen it happen/personally witnessed what that looks like my first thought isn’t like the rest. It’s whomever you’re marrying needs to run ASAP. It also happens a lot more often then we realize. It could also be the other way around where op is the one being abused and pushed/gaslight into thinking this. Another potential is they’re rushing for the “dream” not caring who they’re marrying as long as they get that ring and wedding and is the controller. It depends on tone for the post too- what’s the wording, is it coming off passive aggressive, is it tense, is it forceful, does it say anything else to give insight to the person’s headspace? Not everything on here is glamour and roses and much of it is. This is, after all, the internet.