And all the classmates got married...

grandunification

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I've been finding out on facebook lately that all of my high school classmates (class of 06') are married now. Well not all, but a lot of them are anyways. It really has me bummed out because I feel like I'm so far behind. I've never even had a girl, let alone getting married. Any ideas?
 

trentster

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06? That means they're 20. That's pretty young for getting married, don't worry about it.
 

Principessa

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I've been finding out on facebook lately that all of my high school classmates (class of 06') are married now. Well not all, but a lot of them are anyways. It really has me bummed out because I feel like I'm so far behind. I've never even had a girl, let alone getting married. Any ideas?
That's common in the south and midwest ie. the bible belt. Hardly anyone gets married right out of high school in the mid-atlantic or north-eastern states. And when they do, people look at them like there is something seriously wrong with them. :cool: Don't sweat not being married at 20. It is so not important, nor is it an indicator of success of any sort.

If you're 30 and still a virgin then that's a problem that needs to be discussed.
 

MattBrick

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They are in Oklahoma. That is typical.
I'll be 26 in a few months, and I am not married.
From my perception, it is about half and half with my old classmates.
It is not typical for people in the middle classes here in New Jersey to be married at 20.
Honestly though, I could care less about the people I went to High School with, certainly 99 percent of them. I would not recommend worrying too much about people on face book.

The important point is, you are plenty young to fret over a stuff like this.
Take your time. It would be a much lesser hardship to have been alone for 3 or 4 years, than to rush into a marriage with someone unsuitable and have to pass the entire rest of your life with them. I'd say you certainly have the next 15, if not 20 or 23 years to think about getting married. For now, I would say work on making yourself a more elligable candidate, so as later, to have a wider selection before you.
Go to college. Advance as much as you can in your carreer. Take on a program of excercise, eat well, sleep well, and cultivate your health and body as well as your mind. Above this, expand your social circle, and surround yourself with the best people you can - moral, temperate, thinking, diverse, hardworking, educated, creative and accepting. In their company, you will surely improve and grow, and likely be introduced to a circle of women very materially superior to any you might meet leaving your chances to the wind, or at your local pool hall.

And when it comes to meeting girls, now, or later, take your time and seek out those with whom you share some common interest or goal. From among them chose who give your attention too, and to get to know better. I know churches are very active where you live. This would likely be a good place to start. Also, take classes that you enjoy as well as those you need; you will meet men as well as women who share your enthusiasms. Another likely place to begin might be communtity and volunteer organizations - Agencies promoting literacy, library associations and book clubs, nature groups are all good. You will meet more females among your fellow EMTs, but girls in general will find the volunteer firemen sexier.

One piece of advice I give to you though, is to remember: It is a much more likely thing that a women may latch herself onto a man, than that he have to exert himself to any degree to draw her to him. Beware. Chose wisely, as you too may find yourself in time, and under the influence of the flattery of being the one chosen, in a way of being very much in love as well, your time of selection and sense all behind you.
 
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TurkeyWithaSunburn

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Everyone develops at a different pace. Just because everybody else is doing something doesn't mean you have to... If everyone jumped off a bridge.... :rolleyes: Just go out trying to meet new people eventually someone will strike your fancy and you'll be getting down and doing the bedroom boogie with them :smile:
 

uncut1234

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married at 20? dont worry 90% of them will be divorced within the next 1-2 years, LOL
marriage is a big deal... i would at least wana LIVE with someone and be with them 7 days a week first, and see if i can handle that, before gtting MARRIED, some of these young people today are just crazy in my opinion , live together first, see if u can handle eachother, then u can always get married, whats the big rush?1 i dont get it!!
 

D_Coyne Toss

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At 27 I am only the second who got married in my class. Marriage is an important step, you have to think very carefully about it before doing it. A happy marriage can be a dream and a powerful strenght for your future life. A wrong marriage will ruin your life forever. So, if you are not (reasonably) sure, wait. Anyway marriage means also a bet on the future, an act of faith on your companion.

This said, I don't agree with the ones who say that living together can be a test for marriage, for the simple reason that if you live together you can simply decide, if you don't get along well anymore, to part ways. If you are married, once again, the decision has to be vey careful.

So, marriage can be wonderful, don't be scared by it, but it is important and has little room for mistakes, so be careful.
 

Smartalk

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If you take my advice you will remain single , less hassle alround. One elderly guy once said to me "why buy a book when you can borrow one from the library and take it back when you havf finished with it"

I agree you have pleanty of time before you start thinking of settling down and getting married. There is so much to see and do before then, Live to love and Love to live.
 

EagleCowboy

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I'm from Oklahoma and of my classmates except for 5 of us got married before 21. Most didn't have to. I just laughed and shook my head.

Guess what? They've all been divorced at least 2 or 3 times now and they're over 40. So don't sweat it. Sit back, relax, learn from their mistakes and just laugh at them for making fools of themselves. They'll see you as the smart one. Trust me.
 

Hippie Hollow Girl

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I understand how you feel. The same thing happened to me back when I was your age. (42 now). I remember graduating from high school and then a couple of years later finding out that most of my high school classmates were married. I hadn't even had any serious relationships yet. I remember it making me feel like there must be something wrong with me..... There wasn't anybody knocking down my door wanting to date me.

What I did was to focus on myself. I took this as an opportunity to get an education without having any distractions. In my mind I told myself....."I am footloose and fancy free". I can do anything that I want to do......When a person gets married that becomes a little more complicated.

Anyways for me......graduating High School was just the begining of my real life. While most of my classmates were starting their married life and having babies..... I was off at college learning new things.....and socializing with people from all over the world.

Then as soon as I graduated college everything seemed to fall into place for me. I guess I had learned some people or communicating skills while at college......all of a sudden I had more guys interested in me than I had ever had before. I think my success had a lot to do with .......I changed my way of thinking. And I got myself out there.

Also around this time.....quite a few of my classmates did start divorcing. Some of them are on their 3rd or 4th marriage....or more.

I think a lot of young people in the South get married so young because that is what they think they want to do. And I am not knocking anybody. If I had met the person I couldn't live without at that age......I would have married young too. But I think it makes things a lot harder. If a person has ambitions to go get a college education or go to trade school .......it is a lot harder to do it when one is married. It is probably a lot easier to do the college thing when one isn't focussing on sex so much also. Distractions, distractions......Having babies definately makes college life harder.

Sorry I got off on some kind of a tangent.

The only point I was trying to make was......you are young and your life is only begining. I wouldn't try to rush relationships...... Think long and hard about what you really want.

If a serious relationship is what you think you want.......put yourself in the places where you will meet the most likely successful candidates.
 

whatireallywant

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I don't know about high school, but of the girls in my class in elementary school, only 3 were not married by age 19, and now at age 45, of those three, none of them have EVER married. Two of the three were the two tomboys. (I was one of these).

I don't know about the boys in my class. I think more of them were not married by age 19, but probably nearly all are married now.

I don't really regret not being married. Too many of the women where I grew up were in abusive marriages. Plus what others have said about having been married 2 or 3 times, although I think a lot of the ones in my class stayed married to who they married at age 18 or 19 (or in some cases, younger than that!) Although the ones I knew who married at age 16 are usually divorced.

And yes, I'm from the Midwest...
 
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Pdick

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Sounds like peer pressure to me. Don't worry if you are married or not. When Ms. Right comes along, you will know it's time. There is a lot of upside to being single.
 

OmahaBeef

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LOTS of great advice here by all...

MattBrick went into perfect detail about the best way to conduct yourself at this age.

I think that a combination of factors come into play as to WHY people are still marrying this young, (despite the abundance of intelligent warnings they probably are hearing):

From the female side:
1) Wedding Fever- Many young women are completely smitten with the idea of THEIR wedding. The plans, the rings, the preparation, the dress, the honeymoon, etc. She's been dreaming of it since she was little, so as soon as the opportunity presents itself she's on it like white on rice on a paper-plate in a snowstorm. Reality tends to come crashing down once the wedding and the hoopla is over. Once the copious amounts of attention garnered by a wedding subside, they think..."NOW WHAT!?!?!" (My dental hygienist concurred with me...she was in this group, and now divorced.)

2) They want kids. The bad news here for guys who prefer to wait, is that the desire for them only intensifies as time goes by even if the couple are completely unprepared for them, whether this be for maturity reasons, financial reasons, or otherwise. There is also a particular sect of women who use their ability to reproduce as a near-guaranteed meal-ticket, and in their cases, they win because they get both a baby, and if they divorce... an 18 year cash-cow. The biggest problem here, is that babies are cute, and many that young aren't mature enough to see that this cute baby is a human being who will grow up and who needs to be adequately led by a mature adult.

3) A wedding is the ultimate declaration of independence for a young woman who has been raised by "control-centered" parents. Many times this backfires once they are mature enough to a point that they realize that their "controlling" parents might have been right about a thing or two.

Young Groom's Perspective:

1) "Well I figure since she won't shut up about it, if I don't marry her, another guy will...and I don't wanna lose her!" (It doesn't take a genius to figure out this marriage won't last).

2) "Well I just joined the military, and if I don't marry her, someone else will, and I can't have that!" (Strange military phenomena- Everyone's married, nobody's faithful, bad wake-up call for GI Joe).

3) "I've dated her since 9th grade, we lost our virginity with each other, there is no other woman out there for me and there is no other man out there for her. We are soulmates, we were meant to be!" (The hopeless and unrealistic romantic type).

The thing is this: The sad reality of the situation is that young marriages normally don't last. In this day and age with fly-by-night divorces and a general disregard for the sanctity and totality of marriage itself, they are even more likely to end.

Take note: Despite you not being extremely experienced with women, if you take care of yourself like MattBrick said, smart women who wait and do not accumulate the baggage that the young-when-they-married type most certainly will...when you hit about 27 the women you thought would never even speak to you before will see you as prime real-estate.

Have no fear...

...OB
 

Principessa

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As per usual MattBrick has hit the nail on the head. Grandunification should heed his advice.

QFT! :cool:
They are in Oklahoma. That is typical.
I'll be 26 in a few months, and I am not married.
From my perception, it is about half and half with my old classmates.
It is not typical for people in the middle classes here in New Jersey to be married at 20.
Honestly though, I could care less about the people I went to High School with, certainly 99 percent of them. I would not recommend worrying too much about people on face book.

The important point is, you are plenty young to fret over a stuff like this.
Take your time. It would be a much lesser hardship to have been alone for 3 or 4 years, than to rush into a marriage with someone unsuitable and have to pass the entire rest of your life with them. I'd say you certainly have the next 15, if not 20 or 23 years to think about getting married. For now, I would say work on making yourself a more elligable candidate, so as later, to have a wider selection before you.
Go to college. Advance as much as you can in your carreer. Take on a program of excercise, eat well, sleep well, and cultivate your health and body as well as your mind. Above this, expand your social circle, and surround yourself with the best people you can - moral, temperate, thinking, diverse, hardworking, educated, creative and accepting. In their company, you will surely improve and grow, and likely be introduced to a circle of women very materially superior to any you might meet leaving your chances to the wind, or at your local pool hall.

And when it comes to meeting girls, now, or later, take your time and seek out those with whom you share some common interest or goal. From among them chose who give your attention too, and to get to know better. I know churches are very active where you live. This would likely be a good place to start. Also, take classes that you enjoy as well as those you need; you will meet men as well as women who share your enthusiasms. Another likely place to begin might be communtity and volunteer organizations - Agencies promoting literacy, library associations and book clubs, nature groups are all good. You will meet more females among your fellow EMTs, but girls in general will find the volunteer firemen sexier.

One piece of advice I give to you though, is to remember: It is a much more likely thing that a women may latch herself onto a man, than that he have to exert himself to any degree to draw her to him. Beware. Chose wisely, as you too may find yourself in time, and under the influence of the flattery of being the one chosen, in a way of being very much in love as well, your time of selection and sense all behind you.

 

D_Martin van Burden

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I'm in agreement too, and OB hit on some things that I was considering as well. My high school featured a good number of people who got married right away, and many more of those marriages ended up cracking rather than staying intact. I believe people that enter their twenties can have some sense of maturity about things, but (hopefully-slash-politically ascribed) lifelong relationships probably aren't one of them.

I don't exactly where the pressure comes from; probably on all sides. Parents may have something riding on their children to give them grandchildren or to pass on a legacy, or in higher economic circles to pass along family assets. Young children get ingrained with visions of what they're supposed to do in adulthood, be it a particular course of study, profession, or marital ideal. I think there's an overplay of not just casual nature but the depicted breakdown on being single, dating, yet not committed to someone. (You just don't hear or see much in the way of happy singles, 'cept on "Friends," and didn't they all eventually get hitched up?) Hell, even the life course doesn't really favor the single happy dude. Eventually, you're "supposed" to come to a point that you want to have children or some kind of lifelong partner, and if you don't, somehow you're troubled or off in some way.

I got asked about whether or not I want to be married and have children, but I shrugged my shoulders. I literally, honestly don't know. I think if I were to want children, I would adopt one. But that's neither here nor there because I'm certainly not at a point in my life to entertain those options seriously.

Are you? If not, it's totally cool. Take your time. You have a lot of it.