Engagement Period & Fighting, does this happen with everyone?

edited December 1969 in Personal Issues
Hi all,
I need your opinion with something. I have been engaged for 6 months now, & I really love my fiance. Lately we have been fighting a lot even over the silliest & smallest thing. Is this normal? does this happen with everyone? I started getting worried about my future marriage. Please let me know with full honesty without trying to find passages from books etc. I need real life examples & experiences, I actually had a huge argument with my fiance last night, & till now I can't get over it. Please let me know what I should do. Thanks

Comments

  • Ironically what is happening may actually be helpful for both of you. The engagement period is a time for both of you to discover each other weaknesses, emotions, decision-making processes, .. etc. This is in order to see if you can be the "half" of the other. Both of you must be able to recognize if you can get along and, to an extent, disregard each other's stubbornness.

    With that said, I have to say that it is good that you are disagreeing now to see if you both can solve your own problems. Because in marriage you will disagree, you will fight especially for the first five years. So, what you are experiencing now is real life apart from the romance.

    An advice is to see how each of you react to the disagreement and the approach each takes to bring peace again between the both of you.

    May God bless both of you.
  • COmpletely normal. I was engaged for one and a half years and proposed one year and three months before, all because of different countries, and I can confidently say that 80% of those times without exaggeration, were fights... real fights. Now I've been married for just over 4 years, and never been happier in all my life... can only count the disagreements after marriage on one hand. The most important thing is that both have to seek compromise to please the other. May God bless you both and pray for us a lot...
    Oujai
  • [quote author=baladoos link=topic=12150.msg143484#msg143484 date=1313887268]
    Hi all,
    I need your opinion with something. I have been engaged for 6 months now, & I really love my fiance. Lately we have been fighting a lot even over the silliest & smallest thing. Is this normal? does this happen with everyone? I started getting worried about my future marriage. Please let me know with full honesty without trying to find passages from books etc. I need real life examples & experiences, I actually had a huge argument with my fiance last night, & till now I can't get over it. Please let me know what I should do. Thanks


    You fight over silly and small things??

    I don't think you can compare yourself to others. But in life, there are HUGE things that will worry you, so fighting over small things is not that mature anyway.

    However, its important to take note of these arguments- what have they shown you? THe entire period of the engagement is to know one's fiancé. I don't particularly thing arguing is good - but then perhaps its not going to be like that when you get married. I don't know. Maybe there's just some nervousness and assumptions that you are going through that will indeed take time to iron out.

    Having said all this, you should be praying more. Being anxious or nervous are not signs of spiritual maturity at all.
  • Thanks to everyone that replied to this, I really appreciate it :) :) :), I agree with all what you're saying, but I don't know why fighting worries me, even though it is normal to fight.  I really love my fiance & she also loves me & respects me, but I don't know........sometimes we just go nuts at eachother hehehehehe :) :) :)
  • yeah, u need to work on how to resolve fights. sort it before u marry!
    we didn't fight much, but the engagement was only 3 months!
  • We normally don't fight much at all, but this time we did fight badly & we had a huge argument. We are absolutely fine now, but I don't know why I always have this negative thought that Marriage is always full of fights & argments & lacks peace. What is your opinion regarding this?
  • [quote author=baladoos link=topic=12150.msg143504#msg143504 date=1313957901]
    Thanks to everyone that replied to this, I really appreciate it :) :) :), I agree with all what you're saying, but I don't know why fighting worries me, even though it is normal to fight.  I really love my fiance & she also loves me & respects me, but I don't know........sometimes we just go nuts at eachother hehehehehe :) :) :)


    The fact that you posted it, means that you feel there's a problem. It means that it is often that you fight.

    Why do you fight? What's the problem? I find it a contradiction when you say that you fight yet you love one another, as love does not manifest itself this way.

    You can disagree, you can discuss, you can unwittingly or unknowingly offend the other person, but to consistently fight and quarrel cannot be a good sign.

  • Have you had a bad experience from your parents' relationship together or some other relatives? may be that's what's worrying you about marriage, and not necessarily anything to do with your relationship with your fiance.

    Good Luck and GBU
  • [quote author=baladoos link=topic=12150.msg143518#msg143518 date=1313969672]
    We normally don't fight much at all, but this time we did fight badly & we had a huge argument. We are absolutely fine now, but I don't know why I always have this negative thought that Marriage is always full of fights & argments & lacks peace. What is your opinion regarding this?


    Maybe thats the kind of house hold you've been around growing up. When people live together there will be ups and downs but their love and especially their love of God that binds them should keep them together. Maybe that will make your relationship different than that of your parents? Do you and your fiance help one another grow spiritually? No matter what, if you have that spiritual bond God will be the bridge that will support you two and you'll  get through disagreements.

  • I think we fight over a lot of selfish things, big and small.
  • To be quite honest with you, I have grown up in a house that has lots of fighting between my parents. This is why I worry from the smallest fight between myself & my fiance. That's why I'm asking if it is normal to fight during engagement period. My fiance is not stubborn at all, we just disagree & fight sometimes, not all the time.
  • remember she is right sometimes...
    ;)
  • I totally agree, I'm just not sure if my worrying is valid or not.
  • probably.
    maybe you could meet and discuss the things that wind you up.
    e.g. 'please don't interrupt when i'm talking it irritates me'.
    'ok, i will try, but please don't talk for 20 minutes without a break, sometimes i want to say something too...'
    and pray together everytime you meet, and both work on your spiritual lives (regular confession etc), then when you argue, one of you can say something like, 'ok, now we're arguing and we do need to discuss this important issue, but i want to tell you first that i love you, and i'm going to chill out now so we can discuss it without shouting. would you like a coffee while we chat?'

    and then that takes the heat out of it. try to avoid wagging fingers/fists at each other and thumping the table and yelling and crying hysterically and that will help.
    (not that i ever did any of that in my married life so far...)
    ;)
    oops, little lie...
  • I think also the hardest period in any marriage is at the start.

    Although you both love each other, you don't really know each other that well - you may think you have married a humble girl, (for example), but you will only see the depths of her humility within marriage.

    You may think you have married a pretty girl, but you will only see the depths of her beauty within marriage. (i.e. how does she look at 3 AM, how does she look when she has had kids, when she is sad, happy, etc.. some girls look dead ugly when they frown.).

    Before marriage, no one may really expose a problem - i mean, I can tell you that one of my faults is that I get mad at small things. I can tell you this in a nice way... perhaps over a coffee.. its awfully honest from my part to say the truth about my faults, but the fact is, you will never REALLY know exactly what I'm talking about UNLESS you've seen me get mad.

    But indeed marriage does become easier over time, because i think one becomes more acquainted with the other, that you are CERTAIN that the person you married is indeed someone of substance. (if that is the case). I think for some people, marriage over time may become worse - they may have thought they married someone humble, but only real problems, in real life situations will reveal anything.

  • What you're saying sounds convincing because that's what everyone (that got married) says. But some people say that their marriage is the best thing happend in their life, others say that marriage is worst thing. I won't deny that sometimes I get extremely worried, even if things are working perfectly. I'm just scared of the commitment, don't understand me wrong, it is not that i don't want to be responsible, but I'm just scared because it is a new thing. I also scared of fights & arguments, unfortunately I have grown up in an environment full of agruments & fighting, I feel I had enough aleady. So I definitely don't want to start another life & fight again!. I'm not sure if I can ask this, but how does the physcial part of the marriage affect the marriage relationship? I think a lot about the physical part, & I have lots of questions inside me regarding this important part of marriage.
  • it sounds like for you, any disagreement is a minor disaster.
    so maybe you could ask your fiancee for reassurance that disagreement doesn't mean hate or disrespect.
    as far as i can tell (after many years of marriage), the 'physical' side does not make any difference to the quality of your relationship. instead, it is an indication of the quality of your relationship (if you work hard on your relationship generally, this bit will go well also).
    if you fight before marriage, you will fight after, if you are happy before, you will be happy after etc. etc.

    what you need is a plan for how to deal with disagreements. when you are not arguing, have a chat about 'things that annoy me during arguments'. also listen to your fiancee's side of it. why does she feel she has to yell? what can you do to calm the situation down?
    when people deal with conflicts at work, they learn lots of useful tips, eg. both people need to sit down, at the same level. they need to lower their voices so they are not actually shouting (for some people the embarrassment of the neighbours hearing is even worse than the shock at having an argument).
    be balanced. don't say things like 'you never listen, i hate you' or 'you are always talking to her on the phone, why don't you ever spend any time with me?'
    say, rather, 'i love you but i find it hard to express what i am feeling. can we sit down and talk about this? i need you to listen carefully'. or 'i feel a bit worried when you call that person all the time and are so open with her. i wish you could be open with me like that, and i would love to spend more time with you. could you please spend more time with me?'

    also recognise that little things are not important (e.g. one hates fish, the other hates beans). it will not finish off the marriage if you occasionally eat different food. try to focus on understanding each other's view of spiritual things and how to deal with family conflicts.
    finally, take time to pray together.
    God bless you
    :)
  • Love of beans can finish off a marriage.  (Sorry to interject, despite my single status).
  • I don't know what you mean ilovesaintmark. {Comment moderated}
  • atleast you guys love each other
  • baladoos,

    It seems to me that your specifications for freelance personal responses without reference to biblical and patristic “passages from books etc.” is a very risky foundation for a stable, lifelong, peaceful spiritual marriage and family life. Especially when starting with an openly contentious fiance. Our U.S. Christian and/or secular cultures seemingly support a fifty percent divorce rate and probably a general marriage dissatisfaction rate of well over 75%. This does not include all of the obviously demonic alternative lifestyles. (This seemingly conclusively proves that this fighting “does happen to [nearly] everyone”) The U.S. mercenary divorce and freudian counselling industries thrive on the demonic paradigm  of rewarding rebellious divorcing wives with legal victory in the final marriage argument. This can justify depriving your children of a meaningful relationship with their father and his family and friends (Church?). Of course the husband is routinely stuck with payment of all of the industry members’ “professional” fees and for the long term financial support for this abusive result - as punishment for losing this final, “fixed,” family argument.

    This demonic scheme is well known by the leading feminist “leaders” in every Coptic parish that I am aware of, is of no apparent personal or pastoral concern to any U.S. Coptic bishop, priest or teacher, and is increasingly resorted to by argumentative/ rebellious “self” concerned modern divorcing Coptic women and wives. They well know that the most “profitable” opportunity for this demonic betrayal is while the children are very young.

    If you can’t reach assured agreement to resolve all of your family disagreements by prayerful reliance on the holy biblical and patristic principles of “passages from books, etc,” it seems that your marriage and family could be foolishly built on a foundation of shifting sand. Mt. 7:24-27.

    For these and other vital reasons, I believe that every husband, and fairness committed wife, should provide some longterm counter balance of power for their family’s protection and stability through a fairness assuring pre/ post marriage contract. Such a written mutual marriage contract is the only possible means of maintaining any assurance of control of your family relationships and estate from confiscation by the, well known to be the generally corrupt, insatiably ravenous, U.S. legal/ divorce industry. The crucial elements of any possible final marriage arguments are predetermined, by pre-marriage formal written agreement. This is also the only reasonable means of discouraging and/or preventing any final marriage argument. If an “educated” potential wife refuses to agree to this assurance of fairness to her husband, family and their estate throughout the marriage, I think that should be considered as a fatal prophesy of probable eventual marriage and family misery.             

  • I apologise to the tasbeha community for my comment and deserved  to have it moderated.

    The fighting is normal as we're learning to share a life together. We formerly had our likes and dislikes and ways of doing things, so the fighting is really our way of showing them.

      When we obey God we are loyal to him. When we are obedient to each other in marriage we are also loyal to each other.
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