My brother was 23 and his fiance was 24 when they got married. He’d asked her to marry him a year earlier and she’d agreed, but she wasn’t in any hurry to set a date. Finally he said that either they got married the following month or he was calling off the engagement. They threw a wedding together (which was lots of fun, btw) and I’m sure there was talk, but I don’t recall anyone being crude enough to ask.
They’ve been married for almost 33 years, and their daughter wasn’t born until 18 months after the wedding. My sister had to move her wedding date up because she WAS pregnant and no one hid it. I’m pretty sure that in the OP’s case, the age of the kids had a lot to do with their deciding to prevent snide comments by saying the GF wasn’t pregnant.
I don’t see any need to volunteer pregnancy information, but I wouldn’t deny it if I was pregnant and marrying. One could have a snappy answer to prying questions but why deny the soon to be obvious. I would rather include the news in my snappy comeback
My grandparents eloped and kept it quiet because married women were not allowed to live in the dorm and they couldn’t afford an apt (1925). They were found out and forced to leave the dorms and months later when the dorm mother saw my grandmother (non pregnant) she said ‘oh I thought you were pregnant and that’s why you eloped’
Truth was my grandmother refused to have sex until married so they eloped before graduation.
D1 didn’t want to go to South Beach labor day weekend for her uncle’s birthday party because of Zikas, so everyone asked me if she was pregnant. She said there is no guarantee there is no long term effect, so she didn’t want to take any chances.
Did it though? Still sounds like suboptimal family communication to me. To me, a parent shouldn’t be told at the same time as everyone else at a Labor Day BBQ nor should a parent hear about something posted on Facebook and not feel comfortable discussing it. But maybe that’s just me…
Parents shouldn’t have to find out about their kid’s engagement/marriage via FB, nor should they be told at the same time as other people. But was it at all OP’s doing? Would the outcome be better if OP had picked up the phone to call her son as soon as she found out from someone that her son had posted on FB he was engaged? I don’t think so, because OP would have appeared to be confrontational.
Well, I don’t disagree with some of what you are saying @oldfort but I think the best answer would be to work on lines of communication and to discuss it - not ignore it - without appearing confrontational.
That phone call didn’t have to be confrontational. Or it could have been - if there was bitterness.
The announcement at the Labor Day event could have been a celebration. Or it might not be, if there was bitterness because of the Facebook post.
It’s all a guess. And we all make “guesses” based on the info we have from OP.
I just hope that with the wedding in the distant future that OP, S and FDIL can maybe mend some fences, come to some agreements, find some common ground in their relationship that will bode well for the future.
Sure. In a perfect world, this would be the case. But there are lots of reasons why the lines of communications are cut or severely damaged… and it’s not always the kid’s fault.
My sister is about to get engaged (or she might just elope) and her mom will be learning by word of mouth from other relatives/family friends. If you only knew my sister’s mom, you’d assume my sister was a bipolar narcissist. In reality, her mom is a pathological liar and has been emotionally abusive my sister’s whole life. They have not spoken in years and I doubt they ever will again.
I’m not saying that this is the OP’s case, but I am saying that 1- there are two sides to every story and 2- not everyone has the same type of relationship with their child as others do.
My mother found out my sister was married by reading it in a newspaper. My sister was interviewed for a class she was taking at a gym. In the article, it kept mentioning her ‘husband.’ My mother mentioned it to my sister and asked why they would make that mistake. Sister fessed up that she’d been married for about 2 years, and yes we’d all seen her many times in those 2 years. She and her husband had lived together for about 6 years, had two children, but just never announced they were getting married or were married. She’d been married before (as had her husband) and they didn’t want to make a big deal about it, had invited no one but their children, and were okay with the non-event.
Hey, how about some congratulations to the OP? She was upset about this latest action by her son and live-in girlfriend with whom she and her husband have a somewhat strained relationship, she vented here by posting, she got some feedback here to give her son and his fiancee the benefit of the doubt, she listened, and the couple made a face-to-face announcement at a family event. Plus the fiancee isn’t pregnant, the timeline for the engagement is long, and their remarks indicated that they weren’t going to spend a zillion bucks on a wedding. She thanks us for our feedback. Sounds very good to me!
Glad there was a family announcement to make the engagement official! Hoping the planning is stress free and uneventful!
No problem with weekday weddings as long as couple realizes that there could be attendance issues.Thursday weddings can be difficult to attend depending on the timing. We have been invited to one this Thursday at 5. Many of our friends will have to miss the ceremony as they can’t leave work in time as they fight traffic to get home to change in to black tie attire and then fight more traffic to get to the wedding venue. Our D1 will miss the ceremony as she doesn’t have the vacation time to get away but she is very excited to come to the reception.
I thought I posted this but I guess not - S was supposed to tell us when he came over for dinner last week but he forgot. Since we were talking about that, I did tell him that Mrs. So-and-so saw it on FB and texted me. Just a funny “oops” moment. The only people at dinner were both sets of grandparents (my parents knew because I figured one of my sibs or dad’s relatives would see on FB and mention it to them) and family friends who are also on FB. Everybody just said, "Oh, that’s nice, " and someone asked if they had set a date. My dad asked me afterwards if I thought they wanted to say they were engaged because they were living together and it would “sound better.” I said probably not.
Do either of them plan to go (back) to school at some point? On another thread, did you say your son was a NMF? Just curious - you don’t have to reply.
Sounds like the OP did a good job navigating this potential land mine.
I think at certain points in certain kids lives, there will be difficulties no matter how parents deal with them, and sometimes the less said the better.
We were married on a Thursday, and we will be together for 30 years. No wedding really as noted earlier.
“La vie boheme” is fine. When we started living together in college, my parents and my spouse’s parents (well, his mom as his dad was broke and no child support past age 18 anyway) paid for our dorm rooms. Even though we only lived in my dorm room - his was a double and well, politeness and all required.
Our food and clothing etc. were still paid for by our parents. But we did graduate college together, and moved away. I had money set aside, but my mom sold me her old car for a buck. He bought a new car with my money from summer jobs. We lived in a low-rent area, mainly because we knew we had to stop asking for handouts. And we had to get married, so we could save money by putting me on his health insurance - at the time, we would not have if I didn’t need health insurance. He’s been on my health insurance only for years now by the way.
Fast-forward - all of my siblings and I have gotten handouts as “responsible marrieds”. Most of us were in our 30s at the time.
Reality about marriage - some people just want to get married because they are expected to and don’t care about the “sanctity” and blah blah blah. My life minus my marriage certificate would only be different because of the burden put on single people who cohabitate.
My S and his GF told us this weekend that they are looking for an apartment together. I am delighted. If they told us they were getting married, I’d be delighted. If they told us they were having a baby I’d be delighted. (In any order.)
Of course, they are both in their mid-20s and working in their chosen profession. (Singular, because they are both journalists.)
