When it comes to my forthcoming marriage, what I am most looking forward to, and also most nervous about, is, well, living together. In this day, I suppose it’s rather odd for a couple that has been together for this long (let’s see, we reunited in 2003, so that makes it … forever) to have never cohabitated. But we just never felt the need to take that plunge. (Um, you think I’d give up my rent-free room in my parents’ spacious abode to share a teeny apartment with a boy who hates floral comforters? Heck nah.) So it’s gonna be an adjustment. And to be honest, I have no idea how it’s gonna pan out.
First, here’s what I’m excited about:
— Getting to see Matt all the time.
— Nesting. I don’t really know what that means, but I think it includes decorating?
— Becoming domesticated. Can’t wait to finally wear all the cute aprons people have bought me over the years (gag gifts, mostly) and learn to cook!
— Hosting dinner parties (uh, assuming that whole “learn to cook” thing works out).
And here’s what I’m slightly freaked out about:
— Having to see Matt all. the. time. OK, this is gonna be weird. Even though we’ve been together for so long, because we live apart, I still feel like our days together are like dates. There’s a goodbye kiss at the end. Keyword: End. At the end is when I begin my ‘me’ time. I can do my freelance work, blog, dawdle on the internet, straighten up my room or just veg—all in peaceful solitude. Once we live together, THERE IS NO END. Once, he was like, when we get married, we’ll have to shower together to save water. (Ladies, it’s a trick!) And I was like, but I do my best thinking in the shower! I need to be alone! And he was like, sorry, you’ll have to talk to Mother Earth. Dude. We’re totally gonna be up in each other’s grill. When do I get my ‘me’ time?
— Decorating.
— Becoming domesticated. A recent conversation:
Me: When we get married, I’m gonna cook for you!
Matt: Why do you hate me?
— Bills and such. Le sigh.
In the end, everything will work out because we love each other. Right? RIGHT? Married people, stop laughing at me! No really, we are slowly but surely discussing our current living habits and what we might need to adjust in order to cohabitate sanely.
What’s most exciting about the move is that every day, I’ll get to fall asleep and wake up next to my husband (weirdweirdweirdweird!!!!).
That I can get used to.
You guys are going to have so much fun that it’s silly! As long as you both have your own little corners you can go off to in your new place, you’ll do great.
It’s totally possible to still have your “me” time. You just have to make sure you talk about things and are able to tell each other when you’re on the verge of homicide. :)
I agree with Kyla, having your own little corners is a must.
You definitely need to carve out your own time/space and figure out who does what and how. But it’s great once you find your rhythm with each other and make that work! (I have been living with my husband for almost six years and I can barely remember what life was like before that. Seriously.)
I do my best thinking in the shower too!
I’m not married and have never lived with a guy (in fact, I’ve been living alone for the last 8 years and have gotten VERY used to it), so I can definitely see your thought process here. It would be kind of a strange thing all of sudden…this whole side of your relationship that you’ve never experienced before. Kinda like being married. Everyone I know who has done the whole cohabitating and/or marriage thing always says to not do everything together, to keep your own space too. I like that idea. Even if it is just in the shower!
I am excited for you! I live with my bf but I don’t feel like I do because we have opposite schedules and only spend two nights per week together.
But I love being a team with him, that’s my favourite part. Tackling things, good or bad, together.
Are you guys planning to buy or rent a house together?
Josh and I are taking a premarital class to discuss all these things now, instead of later, when we have problems. I cannot wait for that “goodnight kiss” where I have to drive home and wait a day or more before I see him again. HATE. HATE. HATE that.
The idea of no “alone time” is scary. And finances. He’s good, I suck. Another issue we need to work through right now, before it becomes a major awful issue later.
Right now my biggest problem, though, is that he hates down comforters and I love mine more than life itself and I’ve had it for over 10 years. I know this isn’t a big issue worth a fight, so I’ll deal, but it’s still very depressing for me!!
So, I got married when I was 22.
You’d think I’d be fine with having less personal space/alone time since I’d never lived alone and was practically an infant.
WRONG.
You’ve probably seen me tweet about the fact that Mike & I have very different ideas of how much time together is ideal.
Him: All the freaking time!
Me: Eh, a few hours a day is good. Maybe dinner and an hour of TV?
I just tell him when I need to be alone (communication! important!) and tell him that I still love him and he shouldn’t take it personally.
Also, decorating still scares me and I’ve been married 2.5 years.
Oh you guys will be perfect. I mean, it will be an adjustment but I think after 94 years of dating already, you already know enough about each other that your habits won’t shock Matt, and his won’t shock you.
And me time? You’ll still get it, trust.
Why don’t we add another bedroom to the plans so you can have your own bedroom? Then you can get alone time and decorate it however you want too.
Another problem successfully solved by a man with little to no conversation or feelings expressed needed.
I agree with a lot of the comments above: Everything will work out just fine. All you need to do is carve out your own time and space for your respective “me” times. And it’s also important to still have date nights!
Oh you guys will have so much fun! The waking up in the morning isn’t as fun as it is cuddling as you fall asleep. I’m always freezing, so having someone in bed with you to warm my toes is so comforting.
As for the “me time,” the smaller your place, the less alone time you will get (and the less sanity you will have). With our tiny cottage, we were always together, and I was really having a hard time with it. Now that we moved, we can have our time when we need it. It’s been so wonderful.
In all honesty, I think the idea of living with someone FOREVER is so crazy! But at the same time, I love it. I know you get what I mean.
You guys will learn to make it work!
You guys are already talking about and planning for this stuff, and that is KEY.
Dating my husband for an ETERNITY before we got married did screw with my head. I was so used to our schedule. Not having a MAN IN MY BED every morning when I woke up wasn’t something I thought about, and I can’t tell you how that weirded me out…but I adjusted.
We have our communication mishaps, but we keep on truckin’. We respect and love each other, and I’m the happiest I’ve EVER been. I think you will be too.
You’ll definitely work it out! :) Although, it’s opposite for me! Chris and I have lived together for over 3.5 years, and it will be over 4 when we actually get married.
What I am wondering, is if being married will be any different that what we are right now? :-/ I hope so!
So long as you continue to communicate with each other, I’m pretty sure the co-habitation thing will work out. Just make sure you have more than one room, so you have an escape when you learn just how much he actually farts (dude, I practically lived with my husband before we got married and still didn’t realize how painful the truth would be).
Delurk, mostly to say how I love that you are looking forward to ‘nesting’ without knowing what it is.
Wait, did anyone ever find out? What is that?
Yubo, who’s an only child, used to freak out if I even dared move something on his desk (which sat in the living room of our tiny first apt). He wanted to have space when he came home from work. He wanted to not leave the bathroom door open so that we could talk.
Oh, how things have changed. Heh.
Seriously though…communication, respect, a willingness to hear each other out, to love each other even when you’re really, really (and always justifiably) pissed…that will get you through the inevitable tough spots.
Thanks for the great input, everyone! Your comments are comforting. Seems like everyone eventually figures it out.
Leah – we’re hoping to buy a house or condo.
Alyssa – From what I’ve heard from couples who lived together before getting married, your relationship does change. In a good way, of course. You’ll feel a stronger partnership. But you shouldn’t want it to change too much, right? I’m actually hoping our relationship doesn’t change too much. It’s pretty good as it is. :)
Matthew and I have been living together for around three years now and it has certainly helped mold the relationship that we have today. When we decided to co-habitate, his parents had a four bedroom house with a den and two bedrooms in the back half. I moved there with him, his parents, his brother, his brother’s pregnant girlfriend, our two cats, and his brother’s dog. Needless to say, the situation was, um. . . less than ideal. I went from having my own apartment to sharing a bathroom with three other people.
I would have to agree with everyone. Communication is your best ally in this situation. You can’t be afraid to talk about what is throwing a wrench in your blissful state of matrimony. We laugh about it now, but there were a lot of tears and growing pains in that first year living together and even when we moved out into our own space. There are still things that we argue about. . . a sinkful of dirty dishes seems to drive Matthew crazy. For me, it’s laundry that’s left unfolded and not put away. But the most important thing is that we continually choose to remain in the relationship and make a daily commitment to each other and the life we’re building together.
On the “needing me-space” note, don’t worry about it. It’ll work out. Most likely, he’ll need his space at some point too. And don’t be afraid to ask for just an hour or two to yourself. If he’s a good man (an I’m sure he is), he’ll realize that when you take care of yourself, the better wife you can be.
ok. . . that was long! Lots of love to you!
hmm. i think i can offer a somewhat different perspective… steven and i have been living together since the beginning of our relationship practically! first in the room he had in the apt he shared with two other guys (that lasted all of 6 months) and then when we moved out, we moved into a tiny studio for a year. the next year we moved into a slightly bigger studio. it wasn’t until our 3rd and 4th years living together that we upgraded to a 2 bedroom apt. 2 whole bedrooms and 2 whole bathrooms, can you imagine? we didn’t know what to with ourselves, haha.
anyway, besides communication and respect, i think the real key to us not killing each other in small spaces was our schedules. i was teaching at the time so i would get home by 3 and have up to 4 hours of alone time before steven got home from work every day. we were able to spend mornings together, too, which was nice. in the rare times we did have a fight or a disagreement, one of us (usually me) would sit in the bathroom or the walk-in closet until we calmed down. sounds hilarious now, but that’s what we used to do.
now that we’re happily married =) and in a new 2 bedroom, 1 bathroom apt, i’m finding that our new challenges are of the decorating sort. namely, what colors to paint the walls, how to arrange the furniture, where to put the thousands of books i have and all of his electronic/gaming equipment, etc. a friend of mine who’s been married a lot longer told me when she and her husband were renovating their bathroom, they almost got divorced! i don’t know how serious and/or funny she was being, but it makes sense to me now, however silly and trivial it may sound. our only actual yelling and screaming fight was over how to arrange the furniture in our new living room. seriously.
so, in sum, like everyone else said, LOTS of communication, honesty, and respect, plus time to have to yourselves whenever either of you needs it. amazingly enough, steven and i learned how to have our own space AND respect each other’s space AND maintain a happy household during those years we lived in studio apts. it’ll work out, you’ll see =)
i think one of the most important things i’ve learned in my relationship with matt since we’ve lived together that although it is wonderful to see each other all of the time it is also crucial that we do things separately sometimes and go out with our friends or one of us is out while the other one gets to veg out in front of the tv watching girly movies (clearly matt does that all the time, haha).
but really, i think it’s different for everyone to live together but i doubt you and matt will have any issues and yay for husband! it’s just fun to say :)
I was totally about to write this mushy comment about how great living together is (we are “in sin,” of course) and tell you not to worry about it. Then I glanced to my right at my bed, where Andy’s pillow is in the middle and his blanket is all over, meaning my pillow is half-hanging off the side and I get a tiny sliver of the QUEEN sized bed in which to sleep. (We’re relatively small people, yo. Queen should be plenty.)
So, it’s wonderful, and don’t worry, but also: Stake your claim to a full half of the bed! Do it right away, or else you might end up like me! >P
Hi Michell, u guys are gonna have a great married life. I wish u much happiness & success for a lifetime. Be happy & Stay beautiful.
Much love & hugs!!
All of your comments blow me away. Thank you so, so much for all your honesty and encouragement!
You’ll be great, trust me! I didn’t live with Boo before we got married and while there are definitely some adjustments (where do MY shoes go if his shoes fill the shoe rack?! what do you mean we have to eat something different…not to mention REAL…for dinner every night?!) it’s so worth it to get to see the other person every day! As for the space thing, you guys will work that out. As much as you need your space, Matt will need his too so it won’t be a big deal!
hah…Michelle you’re so funny! I think it’s great that you’ll be showering together to save water..how GREEN of you two :)