Hurt and disgusted

I mostly agree with this. I am 22 and FH is 24 (we got engaged at 21 and 23) so I totally relate and understand how frustrating it is that everyone feels the need to pass judgment on your age! My parents got married at ages 30 and 31 and they're divorced. Grandparents got married at ages 19 and 24, and they've been together 60+ years. I feel like numerical age has very little to do with marital success.

However, maturity definitely plays a significant factor. Both mental maturity and financial maturity. If you aren't done with school and/or aren't financially independent from your parents, you're not really in a place where you can accurately assess your adult-life and who you want to spend it with, because there truly is a ton of personal growth that occurs between finishing school and going into the "real world" and learning how to take care of yourself both mentally and financially.

That being said, I've heard of mature, financially independent 19 year olds with happy healthy marriages, and I've heard of immature 30 year olds getting married, and ending up divorced! Like I said, numerical age doesn't really matter imo, but mental age/maturity definitely does. And the younger you are the less likely you are to be mentally/financially mature, but that doesn't mean it isn't possible!

View Quoted Comment I agree wholeheartedly!! Marriage and maturity have nothing to do with age, but everything to do with maturity and character. If you're immature and careless, you'll never get anywhere and your marriage probably won't last. But if you're mature and put in enough effort, you can do it. Years ago, it was normal to get married younger, and a good portion of those marriages are still going. Now it is more uncommon. But it's not the age that changed, it's the maturity and lifestyle that changed. Back then people used to mature faster and childhood was shorter, but now that childhood lasts much longer, maturity takes longer to achieve. That's why I see where these people are coming from, but age has nothing to do with it.

I haven't seen any hate or bashing of younger brides/couples---the few threads I've seen is brides/couples asking for advice or opinions on that exact topic, and people (kindly, gently, and politely) letting them know their thoughts about it. That being said, I dont going out of my way to find such topics.
If someone is being rude/hateful/disparaging, then I would suggest reporting them to WeddingWire. The community does an excellent job on moderating such things.
I am sorry that well... some people.... are less than tactful on this topic. I wish all young couples out there the best! ♡♡♡

Totally agree on this. But I understand how some peoe might view getting married too early in like be wrong. That being said, everyone does what they want. People should respect that and leave it at that, give good advice and move on.

I don’t think most people mean it rudely. Tone is very easy to misinterpret online. And when you’re in your mid 30s (🙋🏻‍♀️) or older you remember who you were at 18 or 22 and see who you are now. I don’t even recognize myself sometimes (some good, some bad). I think a lot people maybe feel like they’re giving advice to their younger self because they recognize some of the same feelings/actions they had at that age. We’re all just here to try and support each other through the stress of wedding planning and give the best advice we can based on our own experiences. Just take things with a grain of salt. If someone offends you, maybe ask yourself why if offends you and then move on. You know your life and relationship better than some rando reading a paragraph on here. I wouldn’t lose any sleep over the opinion of a stranger on the internet.

Is this about your parents?
Ultimately no one can change your mind about marriage. I'm sorry this is a difficult time for you. Sometimes people need awhile to adjust to the idea of not waiting to be 25 to get married. Or 30, or 40, or never ha!
In all seriousness you're not in high school, independent, and have been living together without financal support. Is it possible a person can be all of those and still not be ready for marriage? Heck yes! But I don't know you. You have to trust yourself and partner above all others before making that decision.
And waiting is ok too. Or a very long yet planned engagement. Or getting married next month wait...don't, that is a lot of drama in the family for years to come. 20's have a lot of growing pains too. You can grow with your partner as husband and wife or boyfriend and girlfriend. It is down to the both of you.

View Quoted Comment Thank you so much! I honestly haven't had much trouble with people on here, though there is the occasional person. Most of it is people around me in real life and I aimed this mostly at them. Thank you so much for the suggestions and support!

View Quoted Comment I agree with you

View Quoted Comment Thank you for your post! I agree with you and see where you are coming from. I only have a mom, but she hasn't been supportive of my engagement thus far. I understand where she's coming from, but it bothers me most that she continually brings up my age. Age has nothing to do with it in my opinion, it's about maturity and character. In these past couple of years, I have grown so much. My heart hasn't changed and neither have my interests, but my maturity has. I have become much more independent and I have learned to deal with any situation, good or bad, whether I like it or not. I wish she could see that, but I'm going to give her time and space. Hopefully she, along with other people, will realise it isn't about my age.

View Quoted Comment Thank you for your post. It was very optimistic and helpful. I can totally see where these people are coming from, but wish that they wouldn't judge so harshly at times. Same goes for the people around me in real life. Thank you for the help and support!

Although its not the case for me, thank you so much for saying this!!!! Sometimes I have to exit a post just because of the negativity in the comments, I don't want to fight with these people for talking the way they do to some of these girls. There's giving advice, and then there's just plain rude, talking down to, which is so unnecessary, and won't help the girl in question anyway, cause who wants to listen to that kind of "advice"

I was young the first time around, 18 in fact. I spent 13 years married to him. I was a mature and responsible 18 year old, had a job, and was in college. Didn't live off of my parents. Basically everything one should be prior to getting married. You learn and grow so much in your 20s. Even out of school. Even when you think you've got it figured out you probably don't. And that's OK. I hope, and expect to, learn even more in my 30s. I say if you want to get married young, go for it. I regret nothing.

Thank you so much for your post! My FH got engaged at 20 and will be 22 when we get married this September. We have been together since we were 16 and living togerther on our own and supporting ourselves since we were 19. Even though our family is fine with it we have received a lot of negativity during our vendor search (we never picked a vendor who gave us these comments) as well as on here when I comment on other forums. So thank you for shedding light onto a situation that is very real for myself and many others!

FH and I have been together since we we're 15 and 16. We'll be married next year at 21 and 22! His Dad would have rather us waited one more year until FH is out of school, and we always have told ourselves even when we were young(er): your parents are really smart, and we look up to them and value their input, we should heavily consider their advice when we think we're ready. Thankfully, they seem to think so too, despite the one more year of college to go! On the flip side, my family is super confused as to why we've waited soooo long and weren't engaged 6 months into dating. And no, I'm not exaggerating. They're uh...old fashioned. Different strokes for different folks...you can't please everybody! Our friends and family who know us are excited, have no issues, and we're getting a lot of "You guys are young...but it's you guys!" which makes me happy to know we have our communities support! FH's newer friends from college who don't know us both are definitely surprised and maybe a little confused, but nothing negative so far! To be fair, I think I look older, and I have my own place and an "old people" job, so I think people are more surprised at my age then the engagement.

I definitely see this happening in real life a lot. I have been with my FH since I was 15 and we will be getting married on our 11 year anniversary in 2020. When we were younger, people would say we were missing out on life because we were with the same person so long. My birthday is 5 days before our wedding and I'll be 27. Now people are asking me why we've waited SO LONG to get married and how I'll basically be old when I have a baby because we are waiting until after we get married to have children (which is apparently the minority now as well). So really there is no RIGHT answer and people are going to have something to say no matter what you do. I'd just say I'm VERY glad we waited this long to get married and we are in a such a better place even from year 5 or 6 or 7 (which I would have been 20, 21, 22 years old)...

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It sounds like our situations were pretty similar haha.

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Girrrl, the "you missed out on life by being with the same person" thing, I FEEL you! That one's a way bigger pet peeve for me than "you're getting married so young!" because at least with that I understand people are looking back on their younger selves, but with the same person for a while thing...do people not know about growing with eachother? When someone says that I just hear "You aren't REALLY living life", as if I'm sitting around tied to my FH not going out with friends and working on my career... "how do you REALLY know if you like your life with him if you haven't had 15 one night stands and 4 different 4 month relationships and you don't go out every weekend, I couldnt imagine being with someone and then not doing all those things!" ...I just don't even know what to say to those people when they go off!

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OH I KNOW. I eventually just started telling people that I do whatever I want (as in travel, plan vacations, go to concerts, go to bars, WHATEVER) and my FH doesn't hinder me in any way so what else am I "missing out" on? Mostly they don't have an answer. I think A LOT of these older people got married young (18, 19, 20...) and didn't do stuff they wanted to (go away to college and travel are the 2 biggest things I hear) and they internally blame and resent their husband/wife for not being able to do that because they got married too young, didn't experience anything, and then had children really young. (I don't think theres anything wrong with that obviously, but they seem to regret it a little) So when they tell us "you should be living life" blah blah...I think what they're really saying is "don't settle". And if you come back with "here are all the things I still experienced/plan to experience and it doesn't matter who I'm with...." they usually go away.

View Quoted Comment Thank you so much!! I've dealt with the same thing and I just don't understand why people can't just help each other and be nice? Thank you!

View Quoted Comment Thank you for the advice and insight! It's very appreciated and I thank you for your support!