Did you feel like your engagement or wedding was more of a commitment?

[Lori]

What kind of a commitment did you feel like you made when you got engaged? When you got married? Which one felt like a bigger commitment to you?

[off-kilter]

To me, the wedding was the public declaration of our commitment to each other. We weren't less involved the day before the wedding, but the ceremony "cemented" the ties with the ritualist reinforcement that we were stepping away from our birth families and joining together to make an new one. I didn't think it would change anything but it did, even if only in my perception.

[Shana]

Right now, I am engaged and I feel *extremely* committed to Brian. But, I have always felt very commited to him, even when we 1st started dating.

I just always "knew" that he was the one for me, and once I met him... the thoughts of any other person totally left me.

Our wedding to me will simply be a confirmation of what we have both known for a couple of years now.... we were meant to be :D

[Sam]

Well we are not married yet. I felt committed the day we told each other we loved one another and the day we found out I was pregnant.

Getting engaged didn't make me feel more committed and neither will marriage.

[Lori]

I felt like getting engaged was a much bigger step and a bigger commitment than our wedding was. I think we felt like things were very serious from very early on, but when we got engaged and made the conscious decision that we wanted to spend our lives together, that was a very big step and probably the biggest moment of commitment in our relationship. At the time, because we were in college, marriage didn't seem like a feasible option, but it was also more of a formality than anything. We had a long engagement--almost three years--and it honestly never felt temporary or like trying something out. I don't think that splitting up seemed like more of an option for us after we got engaged than it did after we got married. I'd say that getting married changed the perception our family and some of our friends had of our relationship more than it meant anything to our commitment.

[Beka]

I really don't know- i wouldn't even say finding out we were pg with Chase, i think for me the biggest commitment was when we decided we'd be turning that one child we both wanted to keep into a family.

The engagement was an outward sign he was going to make an "honest woman" of me :shakehead and was more a case of doing that for my parents as i was heavily pg and people were asking questions LOL Him asking me to marry him was huge for me but the ring & the public show of it was for the benefit of others- for me the asking was the important part.

The wedding was a very significant day to me but i'm still not sure i'd class it as the biggest commitment, it was significant in the fact it was the day i joined his family as well as being part of the one we'd made ourselves so that was very poignant.

[Desirae]

Hmm, I always felt very commitedto him because I KNEW we were going to be together forever.

[Marzipan]

None, really. We were already living together when he proposed and I was 100% committed to our relationship. I knew marriage was really important to him, so I was happy to go ahead with it, but I think our relationship would have been the same if we hadn't gotten married and just continued living together.

[Renita]

I think the wedding sealed the deal for me....granted we were both committed from the day we decided to move in together, which was before engagement & kids. But when we got married, it was like whoa.....this is it.

[Christine]

We both knew, just a couple weeks into dating, that we were committed to each other. But the wedding was definitely what sealed it for us.

[Jejune]

We had a child together before we even got engaged, so that's a hard measure for me. I don't really know. When we committed to having the baby together, we hadn't been dating all that long (6 months) so we felt it would be precipitous to make long term plans about our relationship yet. We committed to helping each other raise the baby together, but intentionally put off all discussion of a long term relationship until after the baby was born. So I think we'd privately made major commitments to each other before we discussed it out loud, because it was important to us that we never wonder if any commitment was made solely for the sake of the unborn baby.

Basically, I'd fully committed myself to Daniel and our relationship some time before I felt it was appropriate to discuss it and I'd say he was equally committed. We had said our I love yous already but I suppose that in a sense the engagement sealed what we'd already decided. By the time Daniel proposed, though, we'd already discussed our relationship and had made a permanent commitment to each other that we weren't sure we'd ever turn into a marriage.

So that was long. Also, how many more times and ways can I use the word "commit"?

[ColleenC]

Nope. We have been totally committed to each other even way before we got engaged. I guess that's part of the reason I don't feel in a rush to do the actual getting married part LOL We have been living together for almost 6 years and have two kids and are more committed than alot of married couples are.

[Kristi]

The engagement and wedding happened with in weeks of each other. LOL but for me the engagement is making a private committment to that person and the wedding is publicly acknowledging your promises to each other. :) Although I do feel the wedding is more of a commitment since it is legally binding and not something you can easily get out of and change your mind on like an engagement. But for me personally the engagement was just as much of a promise to Tim as when we said our vows.