Contemplating long engagement- HELP!

lmo785 · October 2013

My SO and I have been together for just over a year and are very committed to each other and a future together. (We are both 25 years old) We have discussed engagement, rings, wedding details. I feel that engagement could be coming soon, however, there is one thing that makes me nervous. We both will be starting medical school in Fall 2014 which will last 4 years. I would love to be engaged soon, but also would like to wait till after school to get married. Is a 4 year engagement too much? I feel that planning a wedding during medical school would be too much stress! The only summer we have free would be Summer 2015, leaving not enough time for planning! Any insight would be great

FoxandBunny · October 2013

I personally see no problem with a long engagement. It's whatever feels right to you and your SO. Many people have had much longer engagements than 4 years, and I can see how planning a wedding during the rigors of medical school could be daunting. If you want to wait that is your choice, and is perfectly acceptable.

I'm not sure I see how having a wedding in the Summer of 2015 doesn't leave much time for planning, but again that is personal preference and timing is up to you and your then-FI. Just make sure not to push him to propose before he is ready just so you can get married then. Enjoy your relationship as it is now and don't worry about it. It will happen when it happens!

Also, I can't tell from your post if you've already made it into medical school as I don't know how far in advance they accept. If so, congrats! If not, good luck on your applications and such!

PrettyGirlLost · October 2013

I have been dating my FI for almost 12 years, and we have been engaged for 14 months and aren't getting married for another year, sooooooooo. . . 4 years is way too long for an engagement! :-P

You both know yourselves. If you feel planning a wedding and then getting married while both in Med school would be too much, then don't do it.

bethsmiles · October 2013

I don't see the point of getting engaged if you aren't going to plan a wedding. There isn't anything wrong about having a super long engagement if it's what you really want but personally I think it would be silly to have a four year engagement. Just wait, enjoy dating, get engaged when you are actually ready to get married.

polkadot111 · October 2013

Way too long. I was engaged for 3 years. We pushed the wedding date back because H didn't get a job in time and I decided finishing school was most important than having a wedding in the way. If I could do it all over again I would have waited to get engaged until we were actually ready (financially/college etc). I wouldn't recommend that to anyone. For me, the 'we're engaged!' really wore off and it ended up being more of a headache- who wants to think about a wedding for four years straight?? It sure got old quick!

CLoGreenEyes · October 2013

I basically agree with PPs on this, though I would love it if you would elaborate a bit on why Summer 2015 is not enough time to plan if you start school next fall. FWIW, a couple friends of mine, a medical student and a doctoral candidate in... some computer-y field, lol, planned a pretty fancy wedding in about ten months' time while both in school. So it is possible, though I entirely understand why you wouldn't want the extra challenge!

This is totally up to you and your BF. While I don't know that I'd want it for myself, I don't think it would be wrong or weird for you to have that long of an engagement. Lots of time to brainstorm, save money, and prepare for your marriage as well as your wedding - all good things. Really, you simply need to decide whether four years of stretching out your wedding planning sounds fun or horrible, lol.

psychbabe314 · October 2013

BF and I are planning a longish engagement also. We are expecting a 2-3 year engagement. While that sounds like a long time, I think that it will fly by. Since we are younger too, it gives us plenty of time to save up money for a wedding. I don't think there is anything wrong with a longer engagement!

Personally, the couples I know that had a longer engagement (1.5 years or longer) have a better relationship now. I am not saying all couples are that way, but that just seems to be the going trend. My friend planned a wedding while completing her undergraduate, and she would break down several times a week. While I do believe it can be done, I would not recommend or want to plan a wedding and go to college at the same time.

bethsmiles · October 2013

psychbabe314 said:

BF and I are planning a longish engagement also. We are expecting a 2-3 year engagement. While that sounds like a long time, I think that it will fly by. Since we are younger too, it gives us plenty of time to save up money for a wedding. I don't think there is anything wrong with a longer engagement!

Personally, the couples I know that had a longer engagement (1.5 years or longer) have a better relationship now. I am not saying all couples are that way, but that just seems to be the going trend. My friend planned a wedding while completing her undergraduate, and she would break down several times a week. While I do believe it can be done, I would not recommend or want to plan a wedding and go to college at the same time.

I think that's a ridiculous claim to make. I really don't think length of engagement has anything at all to do with how good a couple's relationship is. It sounds like a big reach at justifying a long engagement. It's fine to want to have a long engagement but its silly to think it will somehow make your relationship better.

psychbabe314 · October 2013

bethsmiles said:

psychbabe314 said:

BF and I are planning a longish engagement also. We are expecting a 2-3 year engagement. While that sounds like a long time, I think that it will fly by. Since we are younger too, it gives us plenty of time to save up money for a wedding. I don't think there is anything wrong with a longer engagement!

Personally, the couples I know that had a longer engagement (1.5 years or longer) have a better relationship now. I am not saying all couples are that way, but that just seems to be the going trend. My friend planned a wedding while completing her undergraduate, and she would break down several times a week. While I do believe it can be done, I would not recommend or want to plan a wedding and go to college at the same time.

I think that's a ridiculous claim to make. I really don't think length of engagement has anything at all to do with how good a couple's relationship is. It sounds like a big reach at justifying a long engagement. It's fine to want to have a long engagement but its silly to think it will somehow make your relationship better.

I probably should have clarified a bit more. I did not mean that it was the one reason, it could be a reason, it could be our ages, it could be how long they dated... so many other factors. Sorry! It was meant to be from what I have seen personally. But, it does not necessarily make it true.

When I see friends who had a relationships and a short engagement, they tend to have more problems once they got married. But, friends who had longer relationships (dating and engagement combined), they seem to have less problems (or at least cry to me about it less).

Will a longer engagement improve our relationship? Who knows. But, I do think the longer you know a person increases the chance you have of knowing what you are getting into.

[Deleted User] · October 2013

polkadot111 said:

Way too long. I was engaged for 3 years. We pushed the wedding date back because H didn't get a job in time and I decided finishing school was most important than having a wedding in the way. If I could do it all over again I would have waited to get engaged until we were actually ready (financially/college etc). I wouldn't recommend that to anyone. For me, the 'we're engaged!' really wore off and it ended up being more of a headache- who wants to think about a wedding for four years straight?? It sure got old quick!

I think that, while you're excited and you've got butterflies in your belly and all the good stuff, if you were to have a 4 year engagement, that would wear away so quickly and it would become either old news/unexciting or a big headache/burden. you haven't dated very long (and I can't say much because my H and I didn't date a year before we got engaged), so why not wait a little bit? savor the fun and excitement of dating and med school and growing together, and when the time is right to get serious about getting married, get engaged! instead of getting ALL the excitement over with at one time, let it naturally progress and enjoy the steps as they come.

getting engaged is SO EXCITING and fun. BEING engaged (at least for me), is a totally different story. obviously, it's your life and you know your lives best, but as an internet-friend speaking, I think you'd enjoy the process much more if you didn't do everything at once.

ETA: my engagement was 8.5 months. H and I found ourselves wishing that we would have had a 6 month engagement. I was close to your age when we actually married... in case you were wondering!

Blackbird230 · October 2013

Right now I'm looking at probably a 2 year engagement, which I mean sure leaves a lot of time to research vendors and DIY projects and all, but I don't think I could do 4 years. Even by the end of the 2 years, I'll probably be really done with being engaged and just want to tie the knot!

loves2shop4shoes · October 2013

It's really up to you. There's no right or wrong in deciding the length of your engagement.

In my opinion, 4 years is REALLY long. I had a 2 year engagement, and I wouldn't do it again. That's WAY too much time to obsess about ONE DAY. I agree with @polkadot111...if I had to do it over again, I would've waited to get engaged until we were ready (for financial, scheduling, emotional, etc. reasons.)

But that's me. Maybe the thought of looking through wedding magazines and obsessing over wedding details for 4 years is appealing to you...

motoLyn · October 2013

You would know what's best for you, but I agree with the posters that say 4 years is a long time. To wear a ring through 4 years of medical school and be asked when's the wedding "oh well 4 years from now....3 years from now..... I don't know" Enjoy dating for some more, concentrate on med school, goodness knows that's stressful enough. Flesh out you relationship some more.

While you date just save your money for the sake of saving money. Not sure how you're paying for med school but I don't think its cheap.

Hummingbird125 · October 2013

I agree with most of the previous posters in that 4 years is just too long of an engagement. If I knew someone who was planning on being engaged for that long, I would just think they got engaged to make others take their relationship more seriously - not because they were actually ready to get married. Get engaged when you're ready or almost ready to start planning a wedding - until then, just enjoy your still-new relationship. It will change and develop quite a bit over the next few years, so there is just no reason to jump into being engaged yet.

cowgirl8238 · October 2013

I have been engaged since Decemeber and we aren't getting married until August...I can't freaking wait! I want to be married and be done already! I ave already done all my planning (except hair and makeup people) and I just want it to happen already. My FI and I had dated since Jan of 2008, so what is that nearly 5 years.

In my opinion you can do whatever you like. Some people I knew had really long engagements (one friend was ENGAGED for 10 FREAKING YEARS!) and others have been married within 7 months of the engagement, all of these couples are equally happy from what I know so it really is a personal choice.

One thing I do think, and I would caution you about, is that since you have only been dating for a year or so why do you want to be married already? I mean you know your BF best and I am not trying to knock you (or anyone) who marries quickly but with so much going on in your life and his it may be better to take the time to just date and enjoy each others company before getting engaged. A lot can chage during the first few years of a relationship.

But whatever you choose to do I hope you are happy and I wish you all the luck!

Pepper6 · October 2013

There's no right or wrong here, you need to do what works for the two of you. Personally though, I wouldn't want to get engaged unless I was ready to start planning a wedding.

My advice based on the information you provided would be to wait. You've only been together for a year, which really isn't all that long, and are both taking on a major and stressful life change with med school, so there's no rush to push for the 'engaged' bit yet. Continue to date and focus on the challenges that med school will no doubt throw at you. I think being engaged will just add unnecessary pressure to your relationship at this point.

leia1979 · November 2013

I think even with med school you could plan a wedding for summer 2015. Wedding planning really is only as hard as you make it. I had a one-year engagement and that was more than enough time. There was a three month period in that time where I did nothing wedding related.

One of my best friends is a doctor. She actually wanted to get married school, but her now-H wasn't ready yet. They got married during her residency, and I think she still would have preferred that summer after year two(?--I can't quite remember what year it was).

rcotter90 · November 2013

It's all about you and your SO! My FI and I will be engaged for just under 3 years when we get married and I don't care what anyone else thinks because it's what's right for us. My FI is in grad school and we are waiting for him to graduate and it gives us extra time to save and make plans and make sure everything is exactly what we want it to be on our special day! Do what feels right to you guys. If you're ready now, get engaged now. It takes your relationship to a whole other level and you'll be happy in the end when you've taken your time and gone at your pace and not everybody else's!

motoLyn · November 2013

rcotter90 said:

It's all about you and your SO! My FI and I will be engaged for just under 3 years when we get married and I don't care what anyone else thinks because it's what's right for us. My FI is in grad school and we are waiting for him to graduate and it gives us extra time to save and make plans and make sure everything is exactly what we want it to be on our special day! Do what feels right to you guys. If you're ready now, get engaged now. It takes your relationship to a whole other level and you'll be happy in the end when you've taken your time and gone at your pace and not everybody else's!

Do please elaborate?

phira · November 2013

Eh. The only person I know who was going to have a 4 year engagement was a friend of mine who got engaged senior spring and was about to start vet school. I honestly think it has more to do with age than anything else. When I was younger, I imagined things happening sequentially (college, marriage, house, babies), and now that I'm in grad school, I see things differently (getting married in grad school, having kids once I have a job, even if I'm not settled into a career, buying a house whenever we can afford it).

It sounds like you're both excited to be engaged and have the feelings that come with that level of commitment. That's great. But the thing is that not much is actually different once you're engaged. You are not any more committed than you were before, and you won't be until you're married.

If you are waiting because you don't think you'll be ready to be married for another 4 years, then I don't think you're ready to be engaged either. If you're waiting because grad school is stressful ... life is stressful. Residencies are stressful. Your career is going to be stressful for a long time if you finish medical school. If you are waiting because of financial reasons, then you should be waiting as long as you need to ... but it doesn't sound like you picked 4 years because that's when you can afford the wedding you want.

These are mostly rambling thoughts, and I apologize. I think the bottom line from me, though, is that you need to examine why you're ready to be engaged now but why you don't want to be married for another 4 years.

I do stand by the fact that my relationship has not changed since our engagement, and neither of us expects it to change much once we're married. I would not recommend engagement+marriage if you're expecting/hoping that things will become magically wonderful.

Beads921 · November 2013

I was engaged for 21 months (or something). It was too long. I absolutely cannot imagine 4 years. If you're not ready to plan a wedding, I don't understand the point of getting engaged. It isn't going to change or accomplish anything. I side-eye people who are engaged for any more than 2 years - it always makes me wonder what they're trying to prove. To me, it makes more sense to wait until you're ready to plan your wedding and actually get married.

kaitlynmichelle · November 2013

I think 4 years is a really long time. Why not just date and get engaged down the road?

I wanted to get engaged years ago but I'm glad we didn't. I don't want a long engagement personally - I also see being engaged as the time when you're planning the wedding.

mcmcmd · November 2013

I'm in medical school (MS3) and about 10 people in my class got married after first year. It's TOTALLY doable, particularly if you're planning on getting engaged soon. There's also time after the boards, during third year, during fourth year, etc. Medical school is really not so time consuming that you can't plan a wedding. Good luck!

ceoconnor4 · November 2013

I'm a fourth year med student and got married this fall. It is very doable to plan a wedding either after first year or for fourth year (lots of flexibility in your schedule). I wouldn't recommend it during second year though leading up to Step 1. Good luck!

Contemplating long engagement- HELP!

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