My Relationship Is Moving At A Glacial Pace And I’m Ready To Speed Things Up

As I move further into my late 20s and watch all my friends start to settle down, I wonder if that’s ever going to happen for me. And, as I get deeper into a relationship with a guy I hope to be with for the long term, my feelings about it only intensify. Even though I know that so much has to happen in a relationship before marriage is even on the table, it doesn’t mean I’m any less impatient to get there.

1. I want to skip past the part where we have to meet the families. I have a real love/hate relationship with my fam. I love them but they’re loud, opinionated, and we bicker constantly. I prefer to keep my guy away from all that until it’s necessary. On the flip side, my guy comes from a loving, boisterous family that would rather hang out with each other all day playing board games and watching movies than doing anything else. I’ve dated guys with families like that in the past, and even though I love that he has a caring family, it’s very intimidating to try to fit into a circle of people with bonds like that.
2. It’s not even possible for my friends to meet him first. My friends are my rocks, for real, but we live all over the country and it would be impossible for everyone to meet my guy even in the span of a year. I find that this annoys me slightly because I know that so many of them would be upset if one day I popped up engaged and they didn’t even know the guy.
3. I kind of don’t get what we’re waiting for. We love each other madly, so let’s just do the damn thing! We talk about our non-existent children and what kind of cookie cutter house we would want to live in already, so I say let’s just make this happen. We’re not getting any younger, after all.
4. I don’t want to feel like I wasting my time. You know that horror story about your best friend’s cousin’s sister who dated a guy for, like, seven years only for him to break up with her just shy of her 28th birthday. Yeah, I don’t want to be that girl. I’m not saying that you can’t find love in your late 20s or your 30s, I’m just saying it scares me to date a guy for an extended period during my 20s, which are supposed to be formative and fun, only to have him change his mind later. I could have either been single this entire time or dated a guy who actually wanted to marry me.
5. I want to live with him officially but I have rules. My boyfriend and I practically live together now but I won’t officially move in with him unless we’re engaged. It would be so much easier if we just consolidated everything under one roof. Now, I know that convenience alone is not a good reason to move in with a guy, but I’m just saying that if we were engaged, things would be a lot easier.
6. Wedding planning seems totally exhausting. I want to be married but I wouldn’t mind skipping the wedding part. The thought of picking out color schemes, venues, and outfits for my wedding sounds small parts exciting and huge parts extremely irritating. As a working girl, I really don’t have time to pore over wedding gowns, cake recipes, registries and fonts for ridiculously priced $8-a-pop invitations.
7. If my family and friends wouldn’t be offended, I’d just elope. It’s the cheaper and faster option. There’s no agonizing wedding planning, no family-friend obstacles to jump through—just me and my guy loving each other, committing to each other and signing a certificate to make it official. It’s our business anyway, but unfortunately people would be upset if I didn’t celebrate something like this with them. And the truth is that, yes, I do care what my friends and family would think in this particular scenario. Because of this, as appealing as it sounds, eloping is off the table. Ugh.
8. I’m ready for someone to finally choose me. I’ve been in some terrible relationships in the past with guys that I thought could be “The One” but turned out to be total jerks. Even though my guy tells me that I’m special to him and that this relationship is different for him, I feel like I won’t believe it until we take it all the way. For now, I’ll do my best to focus on myself.
9. I just want to be married. When I’m honest with myself, my impatience stems from my desire to be a wife and have a family of my own. Watching other people live that dream makes me want it even more. It’s hard to find someone you love, let alone someone that you can be with even when you hate their guts… and I think I found that guy. I know that so much has to happen before I’m at a place in a relationship where marriage is the legitimate next, but until then, I’m going to stay impatiently ready for it.
10. I still believe in the man doing the proposing. Yeah, I could ask him to marry me and get it over with, but I still believe that the man should ask a woman for her hand. Maybe it’s old-fashioned and totally ancient but I think it’s a tradition that has morphed into something absolutely romantic. As a hopeless, impatient romantic, I’d like to think that all my waiting will eventually pay off one day.