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This month will mark the third year of Mr. Hum and me living together. That’s right ladies, for over a thousand days, the Hummingbirds have been “shacked up” and “living in sin.”
The plan at the time was definitely not for us to move in together. It had been discussed before as kind of an “Oh, you know, someday . . .” thing, but Mr. Hum was living with roommates and I lived in the world’s tiniest bachelor apartment, so it didn’t seem like it was going to happen for at least another year.
Then, one day, at the end of April, I got a call on my cell. He was completely sick of his roommates and wanted to know if it would be cool if he came to stay with me for a while.
Saying yes was a little bit scary for me since I had never really lived with anyone before, but as Mr. Hum sounded desperate and since he spent most of his time at my place anyway, I agreed. So, the next day, he came with a duffel bag full of clothes and his computer in a tupperware container (he was in school for animation at the time and needed his computer to finish up a major term project) and voila! I had a live-in boyfriend.
Of course, our timing left a lot to be desired, as not only did Toronto have one of the hottest summers ever (over a month of days were almost 100 degrees or hotter), but with no air conditioning and only one openable window, my tiny bachelor felt even smaller. Plus, with me working 9 to 5 and Mr. Hum being a night owl, our different schedules became pretty noticeable. Extreme heat + loss of sleep = One grumpy Hummingbird.
However, in spite of the issues that came with sharing a living space with another person, we managed to get through it all together and made the decision to officially get a place together that September.
For me, our ability to get through those first cohabitating challenges together were essential, and I don’t think I would have felt fully comfortable agreeing to marry someone I hadn’t lived with before, especially since we learned a lot about each other in those early months.
This has no doubt been covered before on the ’Bee, but I’m curious what this crop of readers thinks - Living together before marriage? Yes or No? Tell me what you think.
(Picture courtesy of cartoonstock.com)
Yes to living together. I think that FI and I learn so much about each other during our times living together. I wouldn’t want to get married and realize, oh well we don’t really co-exist together well. Just my thoughts.
Yes for me.
Mr. Penn and I have been together for 9 years. We got our house together last January (a few months before our 8 year mark). I was dead set against it at first - I wanted so badly to be engaged first. I told him he had one year from the day we moved in to propose or he moved out and the house became mine. If marriage wasn’t in his plans, (or at least within his plans for the next year), then he could get a house himself and I would move in when we finally did get engaged.
Well, 7 months after moving in together, he proposed. By the time we are married we will have been living together for over a year and a half.
I say yes. My FI and I got engaged this past January but we’ve been living together for over 2 years. It was just the natural progression of things. I was over his place all the time. He asked me to move in repeatedly but I thought it was too soon (we’d only been going out for 4 months). When he brought up the argument that I was throwing away money on rent since I was always over, I was sold and moved in 2 months later and we’ve been living happily together ever since 
I think living together is perfectly okay. My FI and I have been living together since August, and we’re getting married this June. I can’t imagine not living with him, and it’s been great getting to know him this way before marrying him.
I have a condo all to myself, and he’s living with roommates. We are in the process of buying a house… he’ll move in first, and I’ll move in after the wedding.
yes!! i think it’s great prep for wedding planning and being married overall. when you live together, face the same challenges, owe the same bills, and get to see each other all the time it really feels like a team effort. it’s functional and really fun. we even just got a puppy together!
my family is great about it; they just want me to be happy. his family is extremely conservative and would never be ok with it, so we just don’t bring it up in front of them. that bums me out, but those are things that he has to deal with, otherwise they’ll always see me as overbearing and pushy.
Yes here too. We were in a similar boat - he was sick of his roomies, and I was just finishing up school, so we decided to make the move.
I am all for it as well.
Mr. Cherry Pie and I have lived together for almost four and a half years now and it’s been completely worth it for us. I can understand the romance of not living together before marriage but for most people today it’s not practical to live separately past a certain point.
My feeling is that whether or not you live together, everyone should establish a solid life of their own first. Nothing scares me more than seeing people do the “traditional” thing and move out of their parents’ house into a home with their spouse. It’s charming to learn how to live on your own and wonderful to live together but doing both for the first time I think is too much to handle these days.
I always thought no, but then moved from Ottawa to Toronto to be with him and couldn’t afford my own place, so it turned into a yes. Thinking back, I wouldn’t have done it different, because it let us be really sure we could be together on a day-to-day 24/7 level. Once he started talking about buying a house, though, I made it clear that I didn’t want to buy a house with him until we were married because I wanted there to be some major life events left to experience as a married couple - it felt kind of anticlimactic coming back to the same old apartment after getting married, but moving to our first house together made it seem a lot more real.
We’re in the minority — we waited until we were married to move in together. We’re christians and felt really convicted to do it this way.
We had been around each other enough to know the other’s habits, quirks and living style, and we had many conversations about our expectations in pre-marital counseling, so we didn’t feel a need to test things out first.
I’m glad we decided to wait. The anticipation of it was so much fun and it made for a really exciting newly-wed stage after we got married because everything was brand new and exciting. We were so excited to get back from our honeymoon so we could set up our apartment together. We didn’t have a hard adjustment period either… we both had realistic expectations, so there weren’t any suprises.
Almost all of our friends have gone this route too and it’s worked out well for them.
A yes here as well…Mr. Luna and I have been living together for about a year and it has really helped cement our relationship. I really don’t think we’d be engaged yet if we weren’t “living in delicious sin” now.
Gary and I had been living together for about 6 months before he proposed. By the time we walk down the aisle we will have been living together for 2 years. I’ve known for a long time that I would never ever even think of marrying someone who I had not already lived with.
We won’t live together for religious reason, although I think we both wish we would for practicality’s sake.
we moved in after dating for 4 years… we got engaged this pass january and are now approaching our six year anniversary.
we will be living in sin for 17 more months…
I think it’s essential to “try someone on”. You don’t usually buy shoes without trying them on and walking around to make sure they fit, and a husband is a thousand times more important not to mention very difficult to “return”. This is a lifelong marriage you are signing up for, and if you can iron out the smaller, potentially dealbreaking issues before marriage - you’re only saving yourself some could-be problems down the road.
I never thought that I would want to live together before marriage, but as others have said, circumstances arose, and that’s the decision we made. We both feel it’s the best decision we’ve ever made! I knew I loved him before we lived together, but something about merging our lives completely sealed the deal!
My fiance and I didn’t really want to live together before getting married - partly because our families are conservative and partly because I think it’s nice to have that transition. We had both lived on our own or with roommates, so it wasn’t like we were living with our parents. But circumstances made it much more practical for him to be a roommate rather than try to pay for his own place. We do have a 3rd roommate though, so once we are married we will be living truly “on our own” for the first time.
We are not living together before we get married. It is not for religious reasons or anything. For me, it is important to have something to differentiate being married and not married (besides the marriage certificate), so I prefer to wait. And I never wanted the risk of entering into a lease or buying property without the protection of marriage. Also, I don’t think it is necessarily cheaper to live together, because you could both just have roommates and achieve the same thing, really.
We’re only moving in together a month before the wedding when we move to a different city. For us, this is the best way. I can easily see how for others it wouldn’t be (for instance, my MOH will be moving in with her boyfriend soon with no ring on her finger).
I’m not worried about the growing pains that come with moving in together. We communicate well and get along (something that I had not had in previous relationships). In preparation for marriage, we have started sharing some bills and chores, etc. For instance, we have a kitten who lives at my house, and it’s FI’s duty to empty the litter box when he’s over.
I’m really looking forward to getting married and moving in together all at the same time. At the same time, I think it is really important to talk openly about who does what chores and how the bills are going to be paid BEFORE you move in together, whether you’re married or not.
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Mrs. Hummingbird, Toronto Age and Occupation: 25, Publishing Coordinator Fiance's Age and Occupation: 24, Videogame Designer/Cartoonist Engagement Date: May 4, 2007 Wedding Date: June 28, 2008 Blogging Since: September 18, 2007 Venue: A garden wedding followed by a tented reception on Mr. Hummingbird's father's property. About Me: I’m a pop culture loving, vintage obsessed foodie living in Canada’s biggest city with my fantastic fiancé and our lovable fluffy cat Bettie. I’m stoked to marry my best friend and to throw what I hope will be the most fun and colourful party of our lives.
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