The secrets of a happy marriage remains a secret.
– Henny Youngman
Why do you want to get married ?
So you have been dating for 3 or more years. You are so used to each other than you probably know everything you need to know about your significant other.
Yes, you do turn up at dinners together but spend the time staring at your phone than talking to each other and it is always better when other people are around. She has been hinting for a while that you should take the relationship to the next level and looks sadly at other people getting married on Facebook. Perhaps that would get us out of this relationship rut, you think.
Also read: Heavy Twitter users are most likely to break up with their partner, study says
You wonder, how hard could it be ? Get an overpriced ring, choose a suitable date, get down on your knees and say the obvious to which she will readily agree. Soon this announcement will tear through Facebook and your combined news will gather the most number of likes more than you guys ever got.
Marriage must be easy, you think to yourself. After all, all the married people on Facebook are doing the same thing as you, turning up at dinner, going on trips and frequently reminding each other and the rest of the world how they miss each other while being less than a taxi ride away from each other.
Is it really that easy? Can two different individuals live together without the universe exploding?
Now that is the mistake. Like being stuck in quicksand, you will not realize how deep you are in it till its too late. What do you do next? You surrender to your fate and become those grumpy middle aged men you see at the shopping mall who seem to be looking for neighboring buildings to jump from and land on a sharp object.
Here is the truth. During dating, you will discover how similar you both are and in marriage you will painfully realize that you are both different individuals with different liking.
Now marriage is a process with a high barrier to entry and even more higher and painful barrier to exit. So you better consider some of these points before you take the inevitable leap to prove yourself to be an awesome guy.
#1 Your fights will last forever
Imagine two warring nations armed to the teeth with nuclear power and disagreeing completely with each other. Now ask them to share a bed at night. This is what happens when a fight starts when you are married.
#2 You have a whole new family you did not ask for
They say you cannot choose your family. But along with your spouse, whom you incidentally chose, comes a whole new family with their weirdness and idiosyncrasies which you did not sign up for.
#3 You need to hang out with terrible people a.k.a. other married couples
There is nothing more dreadful than hanging out with other married couples who seemingly have lost the enthusiasm to enjoy life and whole dinner consists of small talk about irrelevant things (to me at least) like investment in property and remittance rates.
Worse is when your wife tried to pair you up with her friend’s possibly boring and weird husband by pointing out common things with him. I do not care if he watches Game of Thrones like I do, I do not want to hang out with him.
#3 You attend a lot of birthday parties for toddlers
When you are married you are surrounded by couples who are popping out babies like a defective vending machine. These kids grow up and since they are extremely special to their parents, they have birthday parties. Your wife will probably warn you that if you do not behave properly at a one-year-old’s party, no one will come to your child’s party in the future. Honestly, I do not want to invite a bunch of jaded, lumbering , hairy adults to my kid’s birthday.
#4 You have to compete with super husbands
Turns out your wife will have this friend whose husband has decided to be the overachieving, overloving, nauseating piece of existence solely to make you miserable. They will turn the world over for their wives’ birthdays for God knows what insecurity they are compensating for and you will surely come to know about it when Facebook shouts it at your face.
#5 Your weekends become a To-Do List in a harsh Labor Camp environment
Remember those Saturdays when you did nothing but nurse a terrible hangover and said to yourself ‘This is what rock stars feel like..”. You can kiss that life goodbye. Weekends are about grocery shopping, changing bed sheets, paying bills and in generally being miserable.
If you did not know this, Victor Hugo probably wrote ‘Les Miserables’ after the first Saturday of his married life.
#7 You will be part of a lot of future-planning sessions where your ideas will be mostly ignored
Women like to plan, I hate planning things I have no control over. Before marriage, I was spontaneous and fun. After marriage, I have been labeled as reckless and careless. I spend most of the time nowadays avoiding my wife when she approaches me with a notebook in hand, asking me my career and emotional expectations for the next 5 years.
I usually don’t even know what to have for breakfast the next day.
Disclaimer: This article has been written by a man-child who may not reflect what other ‘Real Men’ are actually thinking. This is humorous effort to look at how your life will change after the wedding and should not be taken seriously enough to leave your current girlfriend.
Also read: Are Relationships Really That Complicated? With These Lessons, Maybe Not.