Back and forth feelings

Every couple has a way of looking at the engagement differently and your not wrong for your point of view. Its ok to have a long engagement as some has mentioned on these chats.

Some circumstances can be financial, college/university or other reasons to plan for the year later. Money can be handy when you have it. For us, it was the case as much of I hear with most of living paycheque to paycheque and having to make do with what you have.

I started planning our wedding 18 months after my husband (now) had decided to go small wedding over eloping. I get the jealous feeling of others you know that are getting in a year. It won't do any good as long as your happy going the route you are and enjoying the engagement time.

I've totally felt this way! I see other people I know getting engaged and married within a year, while FH and I are having a LONG engagement (around 22 months or so). I appreciate the extra time since it means we get more time to plan and enjoy the process. I was just thinking that I'm going to miss this all when we're married.

My fiancé and I got engaged March 2017 and our wedding isn’t until this May. I wanted it to be a really short engagement and was jealous of everyone’s short engagements too. But then I started to plan our wedding and we did everything at such a leisurely pace but also still got everything planned with plenty of time to spare!
Since we had so much time it was very relaxing and not stressful. Currently the only things we have left to do is figure out the groomsmens ties, decide on our cake flavour, and get our marriage license. That means we can enjoy the last 70 days before we get married. Now I don’t know what I would have done if I had less than 2 years to plan my wedding. Enjoy having time, soak it all in and take your time planning everything so you can enjoy the process more

Oh my god YES. we were together over 7.5 years before we even got engaged, and then are having a 25 month engagement. i used to get SO upset seeing friends meet people, get engaged and then married before i even got engaged. it drove me nuts. we chose the 2 year engagement because of financial reasons and i’m seeing so many people getting engaged after us and getting married before us. it’s annoying, but at least now there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, so to say. And i will admit that the time FLIES! we’ve already been engaged 10.5 months, only 14.5 to go! almost halfway!

I am sure there are people in my circle who are saying why are you getting married after 20 years, yep 20 years and 2 kids but here we are. I always knew we would be together forever and getting married wasn't that important to me but then we had our baby girls and he wanted to be a proper family so he asked me to marry him. Your marriage is about you and your husband to be, you only have to please each other. Always remember that people will have an opinion for everything, listen to them and then do what you want. Also time goes by fast, your big day will be here before you know it.

I get it! Our engagement is 2 years and 3 months. There are a few reasons for this, other family members got engaged around the same time as us and we let everyone else chose their dates first as we are the youngest. Also I've always wanted a spring wedding so that left us with 2020 as our earliest date without being before or too close to the other family weddings.
Most days I love the long engagement! Its created a super low stress environment to wedding plan which is perfect. It's also allowed us to really enjoy being engaged and not just have this section of our lives fly by.
Other days I just want to fast forward to 2020 so the countdown can really begin!
In the beginning people were pretty weird about the long engagement time but once we told them why everyone understood. They also understood that a wedding is not something you want to rush. For now enjoy being engaged!

I also am having a long engagement (2 years!): we got engaged October 2017 and getting married this October. There were a few reasons we had a longer engagement but mostly, it was the right time for us.

We also dating 2 full years before getting engaged, so we'll be together 4 years at the time of the wedding. We could've pulled it off in 2018, but it would've been a lot of extra stress for me.

View quoted message Thank you and congratulations girly!

Don't worry about what others say - do it in your own good time. Everyone has their own reasons, and others should not judge them!

My FH and I dated for 2 years before we got engaged, and we'll have been engaged for nearly 2 full years by the time we actually get married in May. We had a longer engagement because we're paying for the wedding ourselves, and didn't want to go into debt for it.

Thankfully, none of our friends and family had anything negative to say about our long engagement, and have all been wonderfully supportive in the looong planning process! My shower is finally tomorrow!

View quoted message Thank you, all these kind words make me feel so much better

You are not alone in this feeling! When I got engaged we were together for just over 4 years, living together etc. I also have always dreamed up a fall wedding and to me it didn't matter about the length of our engagement, it was more about how long do I need to plan a wedding without feeling stressed out.

We got engaged in Feb 2018, and our wedding is October 2019, so almost 2 years of engagement before our wedding day. But I just didn't think I could pull off a wedding in October 2018. One of the girls I went to high school with got engaged last year, and will be married within 8 months. Which to me is insane because I know how I am with being organized and not wanting to be stressed etc.

At the end of the day, it's what you and your FH want, and what makes you guys happy. If you are going to be together for the rest of your lives, what difference does it make if you get married tomorrow, next year, or in 5 years. Some people do not understand that weddings cost a lot of money, and some need to save for longer than others, and that is OK!

I feel like when it comes to weddings, people will find anything to complain about, and not think about the couple who is getting married. This whole community is here to help! Do not apologize for ranting about this stuff, its good to do it in a space where people understand and can help you out

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Thank you, knowing that I am not alone, or being petty in my feelings when there are all these opinionated people working against others. I will keep thinking and take it as it all comes.

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Thank you, knowing that I am not alone, or being petty in my feelings is why I love this community.

Similar to Tori's experience, we have family members that are getting married before us this year and got engaged after us.

One thing to keep in mind is that, their wedding is about them and says NOTHING about you or where you are at as a couple. Your wedding is about YOU and says NOTHING about them and who they are as a couple

We also had a long engagement (24+ months), and we got some snarky comments: Why are you waiting so long; You're going to ruin the excitement of your wedding; Just elope if you're gonna wait that long, etc.

Needless to say, those comments were sometimes hurtful, but people are just excited for you and wanna party as soon as possible. Plus, they don't always know what goes into planning (and paying) for a wedding. I sat down with my FH and we came up with some canned responses for those comments and held a 'united front' haha. Nothing negative or sassy, just honest answers to shut them up like : We're in no rush, we want to make sure we know what we want before starting planning.

I completely get where you are coming from.

I got engaged in Dec. 2017 and we are getting married this Oct. 2019

Meanwhile my FH's cousin got engaged in the Summer 2018 and will get married in July 2019...

It sucks from where we stand to see others moving faster to where we want to be but it's completely normal. It's going to happen whether we are happy for them or not because we will always get that feeling of "it should be me" and wanting things done in chronological order.

If it's about marrying the person to you then why not get married this year or next year? You could always throw together a smaller wedding that could even take place with immediate family and close friends?

I also get waiting though because that's what we did (somewhat). We bought a house in 2018 and that's why we decided to wait for 2019 to tie the knot. I wanted a bigger wedding and we both have large families (guest list is 250), so we knew that it didn't matter when we said "I do" because we already committed to each other the moment we became a couple and again when we got engaged.

If you do end up wanting to get married in 2020 instead - I'm sure there may be places booked already but that doesn't mean it's impossible. (Especially with this community on WW here to help)