Wedding Woes

You better hope he doesn't hold you to the same beauty standards

Letter from the Dear Sugars podcast:

Dear Sugars,

I’ve been with my boyfriend for more than two years. At 31, I’ve been in a couple of long-term relationships before. This one is different. I love him to death and he feels the same about me. I knew after a week that I wanted to marry him and we have plans to get engaged soon. A few months ago, I went through a period of questioning. He’d put on some weight and his face looked different and I wasn’t feeling as attracted to him. I know how shallow that sounds, but I’ve always been told that physical attraction is important in a marriage, and I thought: If I’m not feeling attracted to him at 34, how am I going to feel when he’s 54? I did some soul-searching and realized the relationship was important to me. When I made that decision in my heart, my libido followed.

I now find myself questioning our relationship again. His physical changes have gotten more pronounced. It seems like a questionable choice to commit to someone if I’m not sure of my attraction to him. I’ve been told by friends that I have a tendency to sabotage myself, that deep down, I don’t feel like I deserve happiness and subconsciously make choices to ensure I don’t get it. I’ve struggled with depression my whole life, so if my brain was playing tricks on me, it wouldn’t be out of the blue. Could this be self-sabotage? Because being madly in love with someone for more than two years and then backing away because he’s put on a few pounds sure sounds like I’m either a terrible person, or I have some issues.

Scared to Choose Wrong


Re: You better hope he doesn't hold you to the same beauty standards

  • One of the best pieces of relationship advice I was given is that relationships are like season, sometimes it's summer and others it's winter. LW sounds too immature to be married, IMO and this is clearly not the relationship for her. 
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  • One of the best pieces of relationship advice I was given is that relationships are like season, sometimes it's summer and others it's winter. LW sounds too immature to be married, IMO and this is clearly not the relationship for her. 
    Agreed. If he's 34, how old is she, I wonder? Granted, some people can be less mature at 40 than others can at 25...
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  • One of the best pieces of relationship advice I was given is that relationships are like season, sometimes it's summer and others it's winter. LW sounds too immature to be married, IMO and this is clearly not the relationship for her. 
    Agreed. If he's 34, how old is she, I wonder? Granted, some people can be less mature at 40 than others can at 25...
    She says she's 31. 

    There's probably something to what her friends are saying - that she is looking for "an out" and subconsciously wants to blame it on him. One of my college acquaintances would do this - meet someone wonderful and before falling totally in love, start finding reasons the person was flawed. It was like they turned every partner into a BEC. Really quite sad. 

    Either way, LW really needs to speak to a professional. If she has a history of depression and self-sabotage and here she is making excuses to leave the man of her dreams.... home girl needs some help. 
    *********************************************************************************

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  • LW = Soon to be single for life...  She's looking for an "out" but doesn't know it yet...

    If she's going to hold a guy to that kind of standard, he deserves better...  Same as-if a guy was doing it to her...  Next, she's visually motivated, he may not be.  Physical attractiveness isn't only a visual phenomenon.  If she is that visually motivated, she needs to become and marry a competitive bodybuilder/gym owner/gym rat that the minimum standard is the visual appearance of health and fitness..  
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