See, I only view marriages as a success once the good fight is done and the finish line is crossed...and that finish line is laid out in the vows you take on your wedding day. You can have "success-in-the-making" marriages, but the vow "'til death do us part" isn't supposed to be just some nice words.
So a successful marriage is one where everyone dies in the end. Like "The Thing."
Sounds like he understood the rule of the three Fs. He was just renting.
The first time I heard that expression was from my father-in-law!
Thought it was four Fs…
Don't keep us in suspense. Floats, flies, the one the moderators wouldn't appreciate, and what?
Well, I suppose it sounds morbid, but at least one person has to die...
...and of natural or accidental reasons (and "accidentally" holding a pillow over someone's face doesn't count, in case you were wondering.
).
Oh! Different genre entirely (high school era), sorry and no correlation.
More like a lease with an excess mileage payment at the end.
Yeap.
That's a very narrow view of success.
Maybe it is - but marriage itself is also "narrow" in the sense that it, too, has a strict definition. Would you say someone had a successful college experience if they dropped out in their fourth semester after failing every midterm? I'm pretty sure for most people, that answer would be no even if they had been getting all As the first three semesters. If you think a couple who received an A+ on their marriage for the first four years and then got an F and divorced in their fifth is successful and not just a dropout with a promising start, that's definitely something you can think. I'm just some internet poster with an opinion, not The Arbitrator of Definitions.
It's definitely not an easy definition or one that makes people feel good, so I get why people want to redefine it or replace it with something else. Or maybe they simply don't get the difference between "successful relationship" and "successful marriage", as it's rather trendy these days to conflate the two. However, I'm pretty used to being considered a stick in the mud about things, so I have no plans or desire to change definitions of things simply because they're not popular opinions.
This is exactly how a newlywed should feel.
It's definitely not an easy definition or one that makes people feel good, so I get why people want to redefine it or replace it with something else. Or maybe they simply don't get the difference between "successful relationship" and "successful marriage", as it's rather trendy these days to conflate the two. However, I'm pretty used to being considered a stick in the mud about things, so I have no plans or desire to change definitions of things simply because they're not popular opinions.
And it is exactly how a person married 5, 10, 15, 20, or 50 years should feel, too. Sure, you probably won't think it's cute anymore when you've spent fifty years reminding your spouse to set the alarm or picking up their socks, but by then, you should have a much deeper connection that won't even be touched by something so superficial. My definition didn't just come from being a newlywed. It's come from an (albeit short) lifetime of observing couples who have been married a long time and who have been through enough crap to have experienced that "do or divorce" moment at least once.
I agree, partly. There is a difference between a happy marriage and a successful one, though admittedly, a very fine one. However, the "happy marriages" that end up in divorce court after a few years of delirious happiness are still failed marriages, and the marriages where the moments of happiness are few and far between but where the couple chooses to struggle together anyway all the way to the end are still successful ones.
Except in the legal sense, I don’t consider divorce to be a failed marriage, nor do I believe suffering to death do us part to be a successful marriage either.
I could say here that you don't know what you're talking about because you haven't been there yet, and that you'll never know what's actually going on in anyone else's marriage, happy or not, but I won't because I truly do hope that it all works out the way you've planned it.
I have never been in a lot of places yet, so I don't have personal experience, t'is true. Maybe I will come back in twenty years and think I was a naive idiot - but I don't think so. If I do, you are welcome to laugh in my face and say "I told you so". But I truly think that I have a lot less of a chance of having to eat my words in twenty or thirty years than I would if I were at the same point in my life and viewed marriage as something you could consider a success even if it fails.
Much better worded take than my previous post trying to say the same thing.
Age 62, married 31 years next month, 2 great kids (plus one terrific DIL).
60, married 35 years, 2 kids slightly greater than Half Fast's. Plus 3 even more terrific grand kids.
I'm guessing your wife reads PoA
I believe that’s another characteristic of a decent marriage or even an exceptional marriage. The spouses can stand to be around each other for an indefinite period of time. If you think about it, that’s radical.
But also supportive of each other doing their own thing. IMO that is essential, and must be mutual.
Agree. Wife is currently on her annual solo trip to WDW. We are both independent creatures and that's all right -- comes with the respect and trust part of a supportive marriage. We've had to live and work apart several times. Nothing wrong with that.
