The Idea of Getting Married Again

Where I’m at

I’ll start this off by saying I’m not engaged. I’m just a nice lady who thinks about everything all the time. I’m in a very loving and healthy relationship with my boyfriend, and the idea of making things official on paper is something we’re into. I couldn’t imagine sharing my life with anyone else.

At this point in my life, the idea of getting married again is actually exciting. I think I only feel this way because I feel like I found the love and stability I deserve from a partner. If you would have asked me in 2020, wedding bells would not have been on my radar. The idea of a killer party to celebrate love? Sure. But marriage itself wasn’t calling my name. It wasn’t a hard no, but it also wasn’t a “I need to find me a man now” kind of energy.

It’s strange to admit there was no big emotional shift, just a gradual comfort with the idea.

The thoughts that show up now

I do have worries that didn’t exist the first time I got married. I hate that. I don’t like how my past affects how I perceive my future with someone who’s only ever been good to me. I find myself thinking in terms of divorce, property division, and protecting myself before anything has even happened. It’s an icky feeling. It takes the romance out of it in a way I don’t always know what to do with.

A friend of mine isn’t on the deed to her house, and I’m scared for her. My divorce was pretty straightforward, but my lawyer made a lot of outcomes clear. Positive and negative. Once you hear those things, you can’t unhear them. I notice it leaking into how I talk to the people I love. I make it a point to tell my close friends that marriage is easy to get into and hard to get out, not because I’m cynical, but because it’s the truth.

The second-time-around feeling

I know life is meant to be lived unapologetically, but the vibe around second weddings is that you’re not supposed to parade around like it’s your first. If you have the bankroll, do your thang. But there’s still this quiet message that since it’s your second time around, you don’t get a big, beautiful wedding. That’s the vibe out there, and it’s annoying.

At the same time, I think I’m actually at an advantage. I know firsthand what does and doesn’t matter. The list is short. My garment. The first dance. Him. Everything else is just atmosphere.

And I remind myself, yeah, it may be my second, but it would be his first. That matters to me more than the narrative I’m apparently supposed to follow.

Weddings and money

The cost of weddings is off-putting. They’re expensive, and since I’d be funding this one on my own, I’m a lot more aware of that than I was before. Having the experience of knowing what does and doesn’t matter, I also know there are places where I could save money. What I don’t want is to find myself planning something that slowly builds resentment because of the financial investment.

The other thing I think about is that my partner is from the South, and weddings just feel like a bigger deal there. Bigger families. Bigger celebrations. Bigger energy. If that’s something he wants, I want to make room for it here. If a larger-scale wedding happens, I want it to. It’s not the idea that stops me. It’s the cost that makes me pause.

What I’m protecting this time

This time around, I’m trusting myself. The fact that marriage is even on the table tells me I’ve grown and healed from whatever I carried out of my past. That realization feels freeing, like finally taking off a soaked parka I didn’t realize I’d been wearing for years.

In the past, I had a habit of slowly morphing into a complementary female version of whoever I was dating. I’d change how I dressed, what music I listened to. Never my hair. Pieces of me would quietly fall away each time. Not enough to make me feel unrecognizable, but enough that once the relationship ended, I resented the changes I made.

Then I’d have to find my way back to myself and fall in love with me all over again. It was a roller coaster I don’t feel the need to ride anymore.

Where I actually land

When I was 26, getting married felt like something I had to do to appear normal to society. That pressure doesn’t exist anymore. Knowing that the U.S. divorce rate is declining is comforting, but it’s also because people are waiting longer to get married and cohabitation is more normalized.

If we do something small, I’ll be happy.
If we do something bigger, I’ll be happy.
If we never get married, I’ll be happy.

The difference now is that marriage feels like an option, not a requirement. And that alone changes everything.