As you may have noticed, I am not your average middle-aged wife. I am young, and married when I was even younger. I'm sure many assume that I became pregnant and married mostly due to that. However, many would be wrong. I was not pregnant when I married my husband. I was 16, and made an informed decision to marry a man I knew would provide for my future, A man whom I love and want to be with. Many have criticized, ostracized and been just plain baffled at the choice I made. I heard comments of "Why would a smart girl throw her future away!?" and "at least wait until AFTER you have completed college" and the infamous "I give it a year....before he leaves her on the curb." Well intentioned family members gave me unwanted advice about the nature of the man I was choosing, informing me that you simply cannot trust men to stay in a marriage. What I believe many of these misguided well meaning people misunderstood, was that men are the cause of most failed relationships, when in fact it is the women who are the "terminators" of the relationship battlefield.
Five years later, everyone has started to quiet down a bit. I do still hear occasional "advice," but apparently no one put money on us making it past our first year of marriage.
Do I think I am more wise than my elders? No. I simply know that they are following the information they have gleaned through culture and media, in other words, I would have been regarding their advice, had we all been reading the same "playbook." Their playbook was an embittered, jaded worldview that consisted of the feministic ideals that were shoved down their throats as children.
I was reading unbiased materials about feminism, they were quoting Gloria Steinem. My husband WAS different (most men are generally better than what feminism ideology portrays), I saw this, but to them he was just another scum of the earth man. My mother was skeptical at the first, but came to support us soon after.
I know the modern worldview on young brides, and it is obviously not in favor of it. There is a stigma that comes with it, of ignorance and un-intelligence to have made such a foolish decision. It seems as though our parents generation would like to consider us childlike well into our late 20's. Incapable of making any good choices on our own, we are to be perpetual children. Have I changed so much from 16? Yes. I have become different, due to my life experiences, I am no longer a who I was, I am a wife, My husband is my world. Do I think I was under qualified to make the decision I did at 16? I truly and whole heartedly believe I made the right decision, and that I was more than mature enough to do so. I have enjoyed married life, being a mother and caring for my children with the expectation that I will not be half dead before I see grandchildren. :) My future is stable and solid.
Looking at my friends who are currently enrolled in colleges that are charging them exorbitantly, witout chosen majors, or even jobs most of the year, I wonder what their life will be like at the end. Will they be sucessful? some will, some won't. They flit and float like a butterfly from guy to guy, trying to "find the one", even though they themselves admit they have no clue what love is, they will simply know when they find it.....like a lightbulb turning on. But somehow, I was the odd one for using my youth to capture the best man I have ever met? How?
Have they changed since they were 16? yes, immensely. They make fewer good choices now. Most are so far in debt they have no clue as to the total. There are none left that stuck to the "I am saving myself for marriage", the virtues they did have are being wasted on men who have no interest in making them wives. When you lie with dogs you get fleas. They have mostly all become feminazi's who cannot or willnot sympathize with any perspectives that do not further their own agenda, therefore they fail miserably in relationships.
Do I think early marriage is the correct option for everyone, definatly not. I do believe with all my heart that marriage today is taken far too lightly, relationships in general. But I see no disadvantage in marrying young, if the man chosen is able to provide well and independantly for his bride and any future children, and if the woman is mature enough and level headed enough to know that marriage is not about a day where you get dressed up and say vows. If she understands that marriage is not playing "house," and that men have different needs than women. If she knows that her husband now comes before, Mother, Father, Friend, children And most importantly that he comes before SELF. Don't get married to be spoiled, get married to spoil your husband, you should love him more than enough to do so.
This is my choice, I am young, and I am enjoying this stage of life while I still have youth and beauty on my side.
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3 comments:
Hello! A friend sent me a link to you, and I'm so thrilled that she did. My daughter is 16, and will be getting married in July. We are conservative Christians and are fully supportive of this covenant.
My daughter and her fiance do not plan on using birth control either. Yes, we get the questions, and the knowing looks, and I'd bet that tongue are wagging as to whether or not they'll make it.
I was married at 18. My mother and her mother at 15. We're all still married! Enjoy your family.
"Do I think I am more wise than my elders? No.
Ahh.. but you turned out right and they had to eat their words. By THAT test, speaking from hindsight, you evidently WERE more wise.
Looks like a case of "aged ignorance clipping the wings of youth", as William Blake would say.
I blush at the thought that I would be more wise, perhaps simply more unbiased towards men, and therefore more willing to learn truth over fiction. Thank you for the compliment, it did not fall on deaf ears.
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