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(Yes, we took this picture during our e-pic session. Foreshadowing? Let’s hope not!)
I want to talk about the thing nobody talks about: fighting with your fiance during your engagement.
I don’t know why we all don’t talk about it more. Do we worry that it means we’re with the wrong person? (*raising hand sheepishly even though I know better*) Do we wonder if other people will tell us we’re making a mistake if they know that we fight as often as we do? (*raising hand*) Are we hoping that it will all be better once we’re married and the silly stressors like napkin colors and the dreaded words “and date” have gone away? (*raising both hands*) Are we afraid to believe that life together might be as full of petty disagreements and frustrations as it is now? (*standing up and waving both arms in the air*)
I have found fewer situations more sad and disappointing than being hurt by, angry at, or upset with him and walking into my office to face a mountain of wedding-related stuff. “Wait!” I want to shout, “How can this be? How can I be bookmarking lovely quotes about love while wanting to scream at the possibility that we might always fight over who does more of the housecleaning?” I do know that I’m feeling more like a “me” and less like a “we” these days and wedding planning isn’t helping. I hope that once we find “our” way of handling disagreements, I will feel less sad about every one, but I wonder if I’m just sticking my head in the sand.
You Mrs’ out there, please (please) tell me: did things really get better after you got married? How did your parents fight**? And if you’re engaged, do you fight with your fiance? Does it make you as sad as it makes me?
**My parents and most of the parents I knew growing up were divorced, so I have very little experience with how married people live.
I’m not sure how helpful this will be, but I thought I’d at least throw it out there. I know few married couples that do fight a lot, but that is just they way they communicate with each other. They are all still happily married and have been for 10+ years. In my opinion I don’t think they necessarily enjoy fighting, but at the end of the night they wouldn’t want to be with anyone else. I think a lot of people fight with their fiance, I know I’ve had my fair share of disagreements. Even though it makes me sad, I know a lot just has to do with stress and he knows that too.
We are exactly the same way. But then I realize - hey, we fought all the time before we got engaged, and we will probably fight after. I guess I had hoped for a “happier” and “more fun” engagement, but I had to face it that this is the way we are. I’m not sure it gets “better”, but I hope that once the huge stressor that is wedding planning exits, that things will be a little simpler again.
It does make me sad. 
Mr. MagPie’s finishing up in grad/med school, so I don’t see him all that often (what with class, studying and work). So, when we do get time together, I have wedding stuff to talk about, and sometimes (only sometimes!) I forget to say hi, and just jump in with my stressors.
I’m optimistic, though, that the situation will improve when he graduates — a few weeks before the wedding! — and we’ll fall comfortably into a solid pattern of communication and interaction.
Great post. It’s so true. Me and my husband rarely argued when we were dating and at the very beginning of our engagement. We did fight. and sometimes badly but it was rare.
when we got engaged, however, we had extreme stress because our parents didn’t get along. That was where our wedding planning stress came - planning the wedding was usually fun. Since my guy usually gets pessimistic in times like that he would always assume that the fact our parents didn’t get along meant we shouldn’t/couldn’t get married. those were our biggest fights during the e-time.
now, that i just celebrated one month (!!) i can tell you it gets harder but it’s SO MUCH BETTER THAN BEING ENGAGED! i love it! all the stress/problems/fears are worth it! There’s still stress from bills and recooping after the wedding, but now, it’s US. i guess getting married just makes you feel more like a team than ever before.
Enjoy the engagement, but look forward to a wonderful marriage! 
a new mrs. here. we fought while planning the wedding, a whole lot. we fight less now, but not by much. one week after getting married we closed on a house. it is as though we traded one huge stressor for another. i think as long as you have major stressors (like planning a wedding, living together, buying a house, children, etc) in your life, the propensity to fight will be greater than if you were still dating. the intimate connection between you and the hubs (or fiance or SO) makes the fighting more likely. for us, now that we understand each others’ fighting techniques our fights are shorter lived and not rehashed.
i sure hope that wasn’t gibberish.
Not married yet but thought I would chime in about my parents who have been married for 36+ years. They have been bickering/fighting about the same 3 or 4 things for as long as I can remember. I think it shows that no matter how much you love someone, something about them will always annoy you and its pretty rare that people change. They can improve/alter their behavior, but they will never change. For me and my FH I fully expect to be arguing over his inability to clean up after himself for the rest of my life. And I’m totally ok with it - just don’t tell him I said that. (ps my parents have also taken advantage of marriage counseling/group sessions to get them through their rough patches. 36+ yrs takes work. I’m super blessed to have witnessed their work all these years)
My fiance and I rarely fight, and if we do, I’m usually the one that instigated it because I can be a pain in the butt. He’s calm and only gets irritated when sitting in traffic-usually.
My parents would bicker, but they usually only flat out argue when hooking up electronic equipment, when they’ve helped me move, etc. On a daily basis, they get along fine.
My mom told me that her experience, which was the experience of her sisters and friends, too, was that the first year of marriage is mostly fight-free, but a few years in, things get harder. Nobody in my family has been divorced. They also didn’t live together pre-marriage and I wonder if that has anything to do with it.
Here’s some encouragement - I’ve heard from several married couples that they fought more during their engagement than before or after it!
The process of merging families while planning a wedding, trying to keep others happy, and dealing with the finances of it all is just stressful. Hopefully after the wedding and there aren’t a thousand decisions to make about the tiniest details (the exact shade of blue to make our centerpieces look good without clashing with the bridesmaids dresses?? ridiculous), everything will calm down.
also wanted to add that FH and I totally argue but it doesn’t make me sad b/c we aren’t arguing over anything that REALLY Matters. If we couldn’t decide where to live, when to have kids, what religion to raise them…you know Big Stuff then I would be sad. Or rather worried about our relationship. Whether or not his dad pays for the rehearsal dinner or who does the dishes at night really has no baring on our long term relationship so fighting about them doesnt worry me. Hope this makes sense…
I love your posts so much! I had the exact same worries when we were engaged. For mem, things are pretty much the same being married, except for one thing. The wedding was a huge stressor, mostly because of the money we were spending, so having that out of our life has helped to clear the air in that way. But it’s 90% the same. Good luck hon and hang in there. It doesn’t sound like you guys are having huge problems, it just sounds like you’re tired and stressed — it’s normal!
To be honest, my parents bicker like crazy! And they’ve been happily married for almost 30 years. Seriously, it’s just their personalities; they are both extremely headstrong and stubborn. I can tell you that as a kid (and now) I get completely sick of hearing it, but it’s just their way.
The key issue is that they don’t fight about IMPORTANT things. When it comes to their core values they are absolutely on the same page. The number of times I’ve heard them fight about something as mundane as missing Tupperware lids I’ve never heard them fight about money or undermine each other to us kids. If you ask my mom she thinks they key to a successful marriage is having the same core values.
As much as I wish they’d learn to calmly look at each other’s points of view and communicate more peacefully (dang Italians!) they certainly don’t bottle anything up and are always quick to forgive.
I’m not married yet (September 09), but in September 2008 I got engaged and in October 2008 my fiance and I moved from the Midwest to California and moved in together for the first time.
We fought before then, the way most people do (most people fight at least occasionally, in my opinion), but once we had moved, the stress of move, wedding, moving in together, and, honestly, our personalities being what they are led to constant arguing. We fought every day. Every. Single. Day. For like two months. Bitter, furious arguments that stemmed from (not kidding here) things like who didn’t clean the dishes.
We both knew that we were fighting about really stupid things, and at some point we both realized that 1) we loved each other and all the wonderful things we loved *about* each other and had in common hadn’t disappeared; 2) relationships are work. Not that we didn’t know that before, but being together with none of our friends or family closer than at least two days of driving intensified everything; and 3) you have to figure out what works for you. We had to find a combination of talking about things honestly the second they happen (his style) and taking a little while to cool down and stop crying and deal with the real issue and not the “who did the dishes” issue (my style).
Good luck! I think it is totally normal, and that there is no relationship that doesn’t involve a few minutes every day of taking a breath and thinking, Is this worth arguing about? I love this person, and he loves me, and I want this to work because it’s good when it’s good. Just my thoughts
A friend told me that being engaged is the hardest thing you’ll do in your relationship. I noticed that I started taking things so much more seriously. I was thinking, “Can I stand to live with someone who will do this the rest of our lives?” rather than just considering him for who he is now.
We fought more during the engagement that we did before getting engaged or after getting married. Mainly, we fought about the guest list and other people’s opinions of our wedding day during planning. Now we are happily married with very little fighting!
I was engaged for only three months, and I’ve been married three months at this point. We were one of those annoying couples that never fought when we were dating, and that actually worried me more than the stupid fights we got into once we were engaged - although I also have to admit that our fighting had more to do with moving across three states together than it did with the engagement itself.
I suspect that if we’d moved in together after the wedding, we probably would have done all of our fighting then, rather than getting it over with a couple months early. It probably also made a difference having had a very small wedding. I would have gotten so frustrated trying to make him care about napkin colors!
I do think being married is easier than being engaged, though. But I firmly believe that your biggest enemy as a married couple is the phrase “for the rest of our lives.” Taking issues day by day makes them so much less daunting… and easier to solve.
I have a teeny tiny confession, first off. This is the first entry of yours I’ve read entirely through, since your situation reminds me a little of my own. I was previously engaged for 2 1/2 years before calling off the wedding 3 days beforehand. So I’ve kind of got the “been there, done that” attitude sometimes. blahblahblah, anyway! I love that you are open and willing to address the less-than-sunny side to weddings, relationships, and all that comes along with them. Sometimes it’s embarrassing to admit when you are fighting with your fiance, because there is so much pressure to put on the perma-grin during this happy time. But it’s not always like that, and while we’re seething, we still have to plan that wedding. Spats and arguments are a normal part of relationships, and I always remind myself that there is NOBODY else I’d rather be fighting with, and if I can still feel my heart swelling with love, even in the midst of a fight, then I know everything is going to be okay.
We don’t fight…we get snappish sometimes, but in four years together we’ve never had a proper FIGHT. We have had one or two weepy (on my part) discussions about “why don’t you find this thing important when I do?” sort of topics, but that’s it. I will say we snapped more in our ten month engagement than ever before ( or after) so you have hope! My parents never fought either. They also did snappishness. My sister and her husband fight All The Time, and I think they’re miserable. But it depends on the couple and what works for you, I guess. But it has to get easier after the wedding! It did for everyone I know!
My parents were divorced after 20+ years of marriage (over money) but when they were together, they never screamed or yelled at each other (that I witnessed). I’m sure they had their little disagreements but they never REALLY fought. I think it had a lot to do with their personalities.
I, on the other hand, fight with my fiance about the most stupid things all because I am stressed about something else. For example, he didn’t pull the shower curtain closed all the way and hang his towel back up to dry…and because I’m stressed about finding a house, planning a wedding, and lack of money, I yell and say I’m not his mother and I’m not going to clean up after him. And that’s just our personalities. We yell at each other until we both realize we’re arguing/yelling over something that really doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things. It’s been this way since we got over the “honeymoon” period of our relationship and I’m sure it will continue when we’re married.
So don’t worry too much, Miss Cheese! As long as you both know you love each other, who cares what other people think! (I know…easier said than done…)
My fiance and I definitely disagree. Especially now that we’re engaged (we rarely fought before). I think the key is not learning how to not fight (disagreements are inevitable), but rather learning how to fight well. Fighting well means communicating, and continuing to put your mate before yourself. I have to ask myself, “Am I fighting my point because I really believe it is correct, or because I’m stubborn and just want to win?” Way more time than not I’m just being stubborn, and there wouldn’t be a fight if I had been willing to work it out in the beginning.
My man is worth marrying, and he’s worth learning how to fight with!
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Mrs. Cheese, Knoxville Age and Occupation: 29, Engineering Manager Fiance's Age and Occupation: 27, CAD Designer Engagement Date: July 31, 2008 Wedding Date: May, 2009 Blogging Since: October 16, 2008 Venue: Our home and the two acres it sits on About Me: I’m an emotional girl who loves sentimental things, parenthetical asides, and trying to do things herself. I can cook, sew, am a whiz at planning, terrible at delegating, and totally in love with my fiancé (who will be my second husband but first love of the rest of my life). For our home/ garden/ DIY wedding, we’ll be moonlighting as interior designers, home improvers, and gardeners with the help of our fabulous friends and neighbors. We can’t wait to be married, and are learning how fun getting married can be.
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