Are engagements an end in themself nowadays?

DH and I are approaching our 56th wedding anniversary and look back on huge changes over the decades. Some changes are for the good (such as living together rather than waiting for the wedding night as was the norm when we got married). Other changes are crazy - the focus on engagement rings, lavish weddings and luxury honeymoons. DH and I had no money when we married. Our wedding was a small do in the upstairs room of a pub. Our first home was a small rented flat with a kitchen/living room and a bedroom. We shared the only bathroom with the owners of the house and paid our rent in cash every Friday evening. You can put away your violins now.

AreWeThereYet.
That would be me. I got married to my first and only Husband when I was 23. I’d lived on my own since I was 18.
It was on the rebound and lasted 10 years.
I’ve been with my partner for 42 years, we’ve never discussed marriage because neither of us have felt the need.

Saggi

Wow Hithere….someone who thinks like me at last. Marriage is a ‘load of old moody’… my mums saying ..,now also mine!
Marriage is loaded in the side of men…. Cheap, or indeed ,free housekeeping for life …..your life ‘put on hold ‘ or completely disregarded until it’s too late. What a waste marriage is. Cynical ! Oh yes. !

That may be the case for some. But for many marriage has been a joyful and rewarding commitment, and your post is quite insulting to those people. Particularly those still grieving the loss of a beloved spouse after many years of happy marriage.

Saggi

Wow Hithere….someone who thinks like me at last. Marriage is a ‘load of old moody’… my mums saying ..,now also mine!
Marriage is loaded in the side of men…. Cheap, or indeed ,free housekeeping for life …..your life ‘put on hold ‘ or completely disregarded until it’s too late. What a waste marriage is. Cynical ! Oh yes. !

I dare say a person’s own experience is very much going to colour their view.

Personally I’ve been very happy with marriage - 48 years coming up.
I am well aware that I’ve been lucky, though.

A member of my family has been engaged for years; they have a DS aged 11, and no sign of a wedding any time soon!

Saggi

I value marriage and true commitment.

I also believe in equal partnership, not getting married for "protection", as if women cannot survive w/o it.

Wow Hithere….someone who thinks like me at last. Marriage is a ‘load of old moody’… my mums saying ..,now also mine!
Marriage is loaded in the side of men…. Cheap, or indeed ,free housekeeping for life …..your life ‘put on hold ‘ or completely disregarded until it’s too late. What a waste marriage is. Cynical ! Oh yes. !

A colleague got engaged last year. She's nearly 40, has been with her partner for 20 years and they have a teenager and an 11 year old plus a house they bought about 10 years ago. They plan to get married 'in a couple of years probably'.
I said all the right things but wasn't really sure what I was congratulating her on.
It was really a 'so what' event and I couldn't help thinking of the huge excitement an engagement announcement used to cause a generation of ago.

I think an engagement nowadays is a strong commitment to stay together forever. Some get married others don't.
Legally, wills can be drawn up to protect inheritance or assets in the event of a parting or death where money or property is involved. My DS and partner did this when buying a house together.
Marriage isn't secure any more like years ago. There is a high divorce rate. So living together is not really any more likely to result in a split than a wedding.
DS and partner who I do call DIL are still together 23 years later.
Times have changed so an engagement is often enough of a commitment without the piece of Marriage paper.
Would not have suited myself but each to their own

Yes, this is normal - but seems pointless to me too. A year before they got engaged by DS and DIL announced they would be getting engaged in a year.

My DD was engaged for 21 years with 2 children emigrated created there own business before they decided to get married. Not sure what it’s all about it’s definitely changed.

Getting engaged on a birthday or on another special day was certainly a thing in the 70s - I even remember a mag entitled ‘Getting Engaged’. I think it was often an end in itself, and was largely about having a ring to show off.

The whole business made my ‘cool image’ dh cringe, so although the wedding was planned right after he’d proposed (he was back to working abroad very soon afterwards) I never had an engagement ring. I did rather wish I had one, but kept quiet about it.

He did however buy me a beautiful ring right after dd2 was born.
A (non-Brit) neighbour said, ‘You got that for a girl?’ but that was the culture she was steeped in.

After 'courting' for a couple of years we were engaged in January, bought our house (a wreck!) in May and married in November. It was a very small wedding as all the money went on the house. I wore my mum's faded old wedding shoes which I made white again with plimsoll whitener!

We moved in together on our wedding night. Any earlier than that and my parents would have exploded with shame and rage. We would have moved together on the day we met if we'd had my choice but times were different then.

On the day we were married I felt for the first time that we were a family unit of our own. It wasn't about money or wills or anything like that, but about love and commitment and being joined forever through thick and thin. Being engaged didn't give me that lovely warm feeling.

Times change and people do what's right for them - good on 'em.

Times change. Simple as that.

What an engagement used to mean isn't what it means now.

My mum and I had our babies in our 20's. Most women put it off until their 30's now.

Things are different.

Ah, a safer place for a woman to live then!

Thanks. That's interesting. I live in Ireland where the laws are different.

Beswitched

If someone dies there spouse is automatically entitled to a share of their estate regardless of wills, children by previous relationships or verbal or written promises.
That is not the case when a couple are engaged.

That’s not the case in England and Wales. Intestacy rules which come into play if no valid will has been made will give the spouse or civil partner (not fiancée) a set share of the deceased’s estate, but if a will to the contrary was made after the marriage it’s that which dictates how the estate will be divided. In that event the surviving spouse would have to go to court to ask for money from the estate for the maintenance of herself and any dependent children. I know this is not the case in all countries.
You are correct in saying that unmarried couples and those not in a civil partnership have no automatic rights of inheritance if their partner dies intestate.

When we got engaged the main priority for me was not so much the wedding, but saving hard for a deposit for a house.
Even forty odd years ago I still thought a large wedding was a massive waste of money, even though my father had said he would pay for it.

Living together was still frowned upon so we both saved as hard as we could whilst living with our own parents, then once we had the deposit for a house on a new estate, we then planned the wedding for the following year.

I do think some women get strung along with men who agree (possibly reluctantly in some cases) to get engaged but then seem to shy away from the final commitment of marriage, especially if the woman has delayed trying for a baby until she is married.

No one seems to have considered that it is sometimes the woman that doesn't want to get married.

I got engaged as a compromise because Mr A kept asking me to marry him and I wasn't ready to get married. I wasn't unsure about him, or considering not marrying him, just not really considering marriage yet. We finally got married two years later when we were more settled and ready to think about having a family.

My hairdresser is flashing an engagement ring but is vague about wedding plans. I just wanted a commitment from him, she said.

I’ve know engagements when the couple been living together 4 years and have a child together.?

If someone dies there spouse is automatically entitled to a share of their estate regardless of wills, children by previous relationships or verbal or written promises.
That is not the case when a couple are engaged.

Hithere People who live together and buy a house together make a commitment but unfortunately, other than a joint mortgage, if something happens to the man and he has investments or savings it does not automatically go to the partner if they are not married. There can even be problems if there's a will if they are not married. I think if there's a joint bank account that would be OK but if they have individual bank accounts or investments they don't automatically go to even a live in partner. There seems to be some sort of understanding that they will, but its not true the Law is not always clear and if there are children from a previous marriage then their parent can argue the case for them to get any non joint money.

Hithere

Getting married does not guarantee you anything- prenups, postnups, a shark lawyer, .....

Helpful for inheritance though!

I know a mother and daughter who have both been engaged fir over 10 years each. I can’t quite see the point but each to his/her own,