When He Says He Isn't Ready for Marriage "Yet"

I received this comment on my HUB When Your Girl Wants to Get Married and You Don't :

RealityTV says:

Veronica, is there any chance that when he says he just isn't ready that he will actually become ready one day?

Dear RealityTV,

Before me, my husband had a girlfriend we'll call Carol that wanted to get serious with him. By his own admission, he's told me she was just completely devoted to him and the relationship and she would be patient and understanding. But what I want to tell you is not what he's told me about that relationship. I want to tell you what mutual friends said to me about that relationship.

"Everyone was so shocked when he got married!"

I'll never forget that first drunken confessional conversation at the bar. Over many martini's, the girls took me into confidence.

"Carol said she'd try to talk about marriage and all he would say was that he was no where near ready. It wasn't the time. Now here he is a year and a half later, married!"

My husband isn't a dick. He's a guy. Actually, he's a good guy. And I'm sure when his ex was pressuring him to talk about the future he felt nothing for, he responded as honestly as he could. He wasn't ready. You have to read into that I guess to understand what he meant.

The first time I talked to my husband about our future, we had been together a few months. I told him this was "it." The big one. This was the relationship I wanted to be in for the rest of my life.

And he said, "Yeah. I know. Me too." He agreed. And the next time we talked about it, he brought it up.

There was no not ready bullshit.

I remember an episode of Who's the Boss where Tony described proposing to Samantha's mother. He explained exactly what it's supposed to be like. He said he had barely gotten "Will you marry me?" out of his mouth, when she leaped into his arms screaming, "YES!"

When it's right, it's right for both of you.

And it's that way long before the proposal.

I am not saying a guy that says he's not ready is being a jerk. Men interpret their feelings in a much broader way than women do. Men have a more limited range or interpretation to emotions. Often men have no need to discuss every emotion to death the way we do. For him, saying, "I'm not ready to get married," covers everything from - I'm not ready to tell you I don't want to marry you, to, Dude I don't ever even think about this, to, I'm not ready this month to get married.

He has no reason to explore the details of that aversion to its depths. He doesn't think about marrying you. Isn't that clear? The point that needs to be apparent here, is that when he IS ready, when he IS thinking about it, he'd know it and he'd tell you.

RealityTV, to answer your question, probably not. It's not really possible that he will want to marry you one day if this is his response now. That's what my experience has taught me. It's hard when it's happening to objectively listen to what he's actually saying instead of what you want to hear. I don't know the specifics of your situation. If he means it sincerely than he will be showing you his intentions. If he really thinks one day he will be ready to marry you, he will be doing whatever he needs to to SHOW you and keep you. He will have set up a joint bank account with you so you can save together for the wedding. He will be house shopping with you. He will be demonstrating committed thinking since he knows you want to see signs of his future with you.

If he isn't doing anything to show you and keep you, if all he's doing is saying he's not ready then you need to move on. Seriously. I'm sorry RealityTV but It's not going to happen with him.

Thanks for your comment. Good luck to you.

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