I married at 22 over 20 years ago did not regret a day... I think a happy marriage is just a lot of luck a lot of self reflection and effort. No matter the age it is not a self running maintenance free system
I met my wife in high-school, we married at 21/22, it's going to be our 19th anniversary this year. So yeah, definitely got lucky, and I would discourage my kids from doing the same even though it worked great for us.
Very interesting perspective that you wouldn’t encourage your kids to do the same as you, why’s that?
To be honest if my kids married at 20 it’s not like I’d try to stop it, despite my reservations about it. I’d think it was a potential mistake but that’s coming from me as concern rather than disapproval.
100% one of my employees married at 40 and got divorced at 45 life happens no matter the age. If you cannot work on yourself with your spouse and vis a vis you are fucked anyway at whatever age
people in their early 20s are more likely to change dramatically later, so definitely more of a gamble at that age
because it's a gamble, you should already be well prepared for life on your own before doing it; that gives you a solid fallback in case things don't work out
I think overcomming obstacles growing as people together is an experience and bonding I would have never liked to miss. Going from a broke ass Teenager to now was a wild trip and my wife was there the whole time. She changed and I changed but we never changed apart because we communicated about our inner selves
But that's where the gamble is. You changed together and it worked out. Others grow apart through no fault of their own and despite their desire to keep things working, they just don't want the same things anymore. Your and my experience are the lucky ones.
If you live somewhere where life expectancy is close enough to 30 to make that eventuality part of your life choices, then go ahead and marry as a teenager. Don't even wait for 20, marry at 16.
Life expectancy is the age most people live to. Some live less, some live more. You shouldn't make plans heavily counting on one of those exceptions. Don't hurry up to do things just in case you're one of the ones who live less, don't delay things too long because you might live to 120.
Planning for living 30 years only makes sense in a place where most people don't live over that.