Every Clod Has A Silver Lining
I'm a mature 21-year-old woman considering a relationship with a 30-year-old man, but I worry about our age difference. I've yet to graduate, and live the life of a student, but I don't want to miss out on the guy of my dreams.
--Unsure
Yippee, you can now be tried as an adult, but don't be on your high horse about how all growed-up you are. At 21, everyone thinks they're "mature." By 23, some catch a whiff of what blithering idiots they've been. At 30, many have nine years of proof. Making matters worse, you're from one of the most overmommied generations ever. While the original umbilical cord is still cut at birth, there are now aftermarket versions from Sprint, AT&T, and Verizon. One 20-something girl complained on a blog that her mother calls her every 30 minutes when she's out. Once, when she didn't reply right away, she logged 96 missed calls from Psychomommy.
Even if your parents aren't all helicoptery, the last thing you need now is a guy you'll look up to as some elder statesman with all the answers, eliminating the need for you to flail around and find them for yourself. In fact, there's never been a better time for you to miss out on the guy of your dreams. Your dreams are likely to be rather different at 25, let alone 30, making your 20s, especially your early 20s, the ideal time to date all the wrong guys. Avoid locking onto Mr. Dreamy today and you might avoid waking up at 30 with the urge to date a garage band drummer with a part-time job shoplifting.
When I was 22 I met a guy who looked a lot younger than he was. After we had been going out a while I caught a glimpse of his licence and saw that he was 14 years older than me, but by then I was head over heels. We married, and were happy at first, but then something happened. I grew up. I finished college, got a great job making more than him, had a ton of friends, and he....fossilized. He didn't want me to be anything but that silly little 22 yr old he had met all those years before.
Please understand that you will change, and you will be a different person 5, 10, 15 years from now. I'm not saying that this man is wrong, just that you should make sure that he is..mature... enough to handle the changes and grow with you.
Kat at July 20, 2010 6:45 PM
No doubt our culture leans towards a prolonged adolescence, with a major emphasis on Finding Yourself a la Eat, Pray, Love, but that doesn't mean that no 21-year-old is ready for a serious relationship. It seems to me like there are probably certain common experiences that you should have before being in a serious relationship: living on your own, supporting yourself, having previous relationship experience as well as having previous time being single. Some people hit these milestones until 25, others at 18, and there IS a wide spread of maturity among 21 year olds.
My parents met at age 23 and 32, and my best friend's parents (who are like my second family) met at 18 and 26. Both couples have been married over 25 years and have some of the best relationships that I've observed. Both my mom and my friend's mom were pretty mature-my mom was a grad student who had put herself through college working 3 jobs, and my friend's mom was living on her own and working fulltime to support herself. They had the experiences that you're "supposed" to have in your twenties-travel, education, developing a career-they just happened to be in a relationship while doing so. Both couples also had the luxury of being together for 7-8 years before having kids, which isn't as feasible when you meet your husband at 38.
And that's the flipside of the issue: when women seek out a partner young, they have maximum options because they're at their peak, and they have maximum flexibility in terms of timing their family. Whereas if you wait too long, your problem becomes that of the woman in this column: http://www.advicegoddess.com/ag-column-archives/2010/06/sperm-wail.html, who is 36 years old and ready to tie the knot with the next breathing male who crosses her path.
Life is a series of trade offs, and if your priority is to be married and raise a family, then I think it's OK to consciously miss out on living the crazy single life, or traveling the world, or getting your PhD. This isn't exactly the advice that high school guidance counselors are handing out, but it might be good for women to hear. Besides, it's not like LW is deciding whether or not to get married-just to embark on a serious relationship. It likely WON'T work out, but it's still great practice for figuring out who you are and what you want in a relationship.
Shannon at July 20, 2010 9:16 PM
Amy seems to be jumping to a lot of conclusions. Is there some information about the LW that we're not privy to?
Like Shannon pointed out, people mature differently. In my experience, the women I know who'd been more relationship oriented in their early twenties are in a much better place now than the ones who fucked around.
From what I've observed, a bit of an age difference often works for couples, especially as they get older.
Janoodle at July 21, 2010 6:59 AM
I am torn on this one. For the most part, I can agree with your advice Amy.
But, I was one of those people who grew up fast and matured early. By my early 20's, I was already supporting myself, out of college, and working towards my career. I never had that early 20's rebellion and didn't want it. I just donn't care for the party lifestyle. I did date a lot of duds so I did get to experiance all the ups and downs of "love" and overall, my dating life was pretty good. I was perfectly content to be alone too though. I had a rich social life and was working on building my career. I never really felt the NEED to get married. I didn't NEED a man to make me happy. I just figured it would happen if it was meant to happen but if it didn't, that was okay too. That makes a difference I think. When I wasn't actively looking to date, and was just content with myself, I found that I was more desireable by men and had much better relationships.
I got involved with my now husband, who was in his mid 30's when I was 25 and we married when I was 27. I am 29 now and we are happy as hell. I do recongnize that things may change in a few years, because change is inevitabble. And they will likely change after we have kids, but in my case, I don't think *I* will change so much that it will make such a difference to our relationship (except to make it better). Barring some tragedy or drastic life choice, I am pretty much who I am going to be already. But, that is just me.
However, I have a girlfriend who is exactly my same age, down to the day actually, who isn't even ready for a real boyfriend yet, much less a marriage. ESPECIALLY with an older man. The girl has major Daddy issues! For her, your advice in this situation is almost perfect. There is also the factor that we grew up in very different environments and have different mentalities on life. So, I guess it depends on the girl really.
Sabrina at July 21, 2010 7:58 AM
I should also point out that I had been living on my own since 16. I didn't need to go through that part of life in my 20's because I went through it before I was even 20. So I guess in my case, I was an exception... And my husband is well aware of my past circumstances and accepts my "damage" so to speak.
Sabrina at July 21, 2010 8:12 AM
I usually agree with Amy's advice to people, but I think she's dead wrong this time.
First of all: If it's really true that the average 21 year old in the USA is still an immature baby, then there must be something horribly wrong with our whole culture. For 99.9% of human history -- i.e. the past 100,000 years -- children were expected to turn into adults somewhere around age 13, give or take a year. Have we undergone some kind of burst of reverse evolution in the last 60 years, or what?
Within my lifetime, 13 was still legal age for females to marry in some parts of the USA, and I think it still is legal age in most of Latin America, so how in the heck can 21 be "too young"?
cato-999 at July 21, 2010 9:11 AM
I really hope Amy has some extra info that we're not privy to, but, most of her advice on related subjects seems to encourage people to not even consider marriage until they're over 30.
Instead of throwing some magic age where it's suddenly okay for people to get married, why not give them a list of things to consider?
I lived on my own from 18 to 23. I supported myself, never had a roomate. I did the party thing and found that I didn't like it. I had broken the helocopter relationship with my parents by that point. I had dated many people, both seriously and not seriously. I was happy with myself, but, also ready to expand my life to include a serious, committed partner.
Long story short, I met my husband at 23, dated him for two years and have been happily married for coming up on five years.
Not everyone needs to party for a decade or have an extra ten years of adolesence in order to be ready for a committed relationship.
Red at July 21, 2010 9:27 AM
LW: Marry the guy. My wife is a couple decades younger, and it is as good as any marriage is going to be, which is okay.
Right now, you think your life is extremely important and every decision you make is drenched in drama and importance. After a while you will realize you are one of seven billion people on earth, and there is no god, meaning you are much like an ant.
Really, what happens in your life is supremely unimportant, so if some guy overlooks your self-obsessed nature and is willing to marry you,. then do it, and count yourself lucky.
BOTU at July 21, 2010 9:33 AM
It depends on the people. My older daughter married, right when she should have been graduating from college (forgot to tell dad she was on the five year plan.) Immature, right? Well, she's spent over two years on her own while her husband was deployed to Iraq, including a year alone in Germany and a year in Hawaii with a young child. During the seven or so years she's been married, she has helped with spouses associations as well as taking care of her household and coped with a couple of long distance moves. Sometimes our own kids maturity surprises us. (Her husband isn't much older than she is.) College grad - check. See the world - check. I'm not sure she missed much.
There are others who never grow up and are going to be nothing but heartache to anyone who depends on them. I have a brother who fits that description. Age is not a synonym for maturity, nor does it guarantee you are going to have any sort of life experience you'd want to talk about.
Know yourself and live your life on your terms. As far as I know, we don't get any do overs.
MarkD at July 21, 2010 11:17 AM
I think that I've been seeing a change in attitudes regarding marrying younger. It's not so taboo to acknowledge that this might be a legitimate path for women any longer. Even for women who want careers. The idea being that it may be better to have kids young and then start a career when they're more independent, rather than wait until you're 35.
Janoodle at July 21, 2010 11:19 AM
Reverse evolution is a good term for it cato.
Once upon a time, there was no such thing really as "childhood" small children didn't have lots of play time, they had responsibilities from an early age, hardships make people grow up FAST.
Today, how much hardship does the average child endure? They're helicoptered into adulthood with little to no failure, few real challenges, and almost no level of responsibility. So yes, someone is basically just a big kid in their early twenties, prone to mistakes that were not even available for people to make in ancient times.
Robert at July 21, 2010 2:01 PM
" ... Even for women who want careers. The idea being that it may be better to have kids young and then start a career when they're more independent, rather than wait until you're 35...."
That is more-or-less the plan that my (second) wife & I had when we got married. She was 20 and I was 45, and we had an unwritten understanding that I would put her through college and maybe grad school while we were raising kids, and then about the time that the kids were in college, I'd be able to retire and she would be at the peak of *her* earnings curve.
The idea is sort of working, but the arrival of the "mid-life surprise baby" when she was 38 and I was 63 certainly complicated things :-) My retirement plans are now on indefinite hold.
But Hey! If life were predictable, it would be boring, right?
cato-999 at July 21, 2010 3:24 PM
we had an unwritten understanding
Cato-999 - I'm not prying and don't expect you to answer if you don't want. But was this an "unwritten" or "unspoken" understanding? And was it really understood by both sides?
You sound pretty relaxed about it so I'm guessing the former. But I've seen a few of these long term plans fall apart because the aims of the partners diverged eventually. Just one of those risks I guess.
It is a sensible way of doing things if you can find someone who wants it and is ready at the same time. I've never wanted kids but I must admit I've never worked out how I would have handled the timing issue if I did.
Ltw at July 22, 2010 7:33 AM
Ltw: I'm not sure if I fully understand the question. When I said "unwritten" I just meant that there was no formal pre-nuptial agreement or anything like that. In fact, after 18 years, I don't even remember for sure if there was ever a formal verbal understanding; it might have been just one of those things that we would chat about occasionally.
Anyhow, we had two children right away and then, as soon as they were old enough for pre-school, she went back and finished her B.A. degree and started on her Masters. But about half way through the Masters, she got bored with going to school and both of us started getting lazy. I was making a good salary, there didn't seem to be any time pressure, we decided to home-school the kids, etc., etc.
And then, just a couple of years ago, when the youngest of the two original kids started high school, she finally decided that she was going to get serious again about starting up her own career. But literally just a few weeks after making that decision, she found out that she was pregnant. .... And here we are!
OH! And as a cautionary warning for any other late 30-ish women who are reading this: At the time she got pregnant, she had a properly installed IUD that was about 5 years into its (supposed) 10 year lifetime. The ob/gyn refused to believe she was pregnant until they did an ultrasound and picked up the fetal heartbeat.
cato-999 at July 22, 2010 8:47 AM
Thank you cato-999, I was only wondering whether it was something you both understood or whether you thought that was the plan and she didn't. Sounds like just one of things that happens and you're both handling it well. Best of luck :)
And thanks for reminding me to finally get around to that vasectomy, although even that isn't a guarantee. I knew a couple that did it then still got pregnant, it almost broke up their marriage till he got tested and found it had healed.
Ltw at July 22, 2010 9:30 PM
When I was 21 I married a 30yo. We had been dating for 2.5 years and we spent the last 8 months or so of our dating time negotiating our marriage. Kids, work, money, careers, where to live, our parents, etc. It's been 23 years and we're doing pretty well!
liquid at July 23, 2010 5:41 AM
9 or 10 years is a much bigger gap at 21 than it is at 25 or 30, for most people. Many 21yr old that I know are like teenagers.
But I cringe whenever I hear the advice that young women should wait until their 30's before they consider a serious relationship. This really isn't a good idea and the evidence is all over the place.
martine at July 23, 2010 9:01 AM
Amy Alkon
https://www.advicegoddess.com/ag-column-archives/2010/07/every-clod-has.html#comment-1735924">comment from martineI think American adolescence ends at 30 these days, generally speaking. It isn't that ALL women should wait, but the stuff I laid out in the piece is true. Many who marry in their early 20s then figure out who they are in their late 20s and get divorced. But, people are ultimately individuals. Then again, a 20-something woman with a 30-something guy is very likely to stunt her growth by being with him.
Amy Alkon at July 23, 2010 9:39 AM
Let us review the "rule-of-thumb": http://xkcd.com/314/
DavidJ at July 23, 2010 6:24 PM
"It isn't that ALL women should wait, but the stuff I laid out in the piece is true."
Not just that, but in this case the LW has specifically laid her cards on the table that she is not ready and still wants to 'stuff around' before she settles down. Not in so many words, but the desire is expressed very clearly in the wording: "I've yet to graduate, and live the life of a student". Telling "all women" to wait would be one thing, but telling someone who is basically screaming "I'm not ready (but just wish I didn't have to decide now between one or the other)" to wait seems fairly sensible.
Personally I hate that childish whole "I want to play around now and settle down later" extended-adolescence behaviour, it seemed childish and stupid to me at 16 and seems just as childish and stupid to me now at 33 --- but reality is reality, that's how people are, and you can't make someone grow up if they're in that modern "arrested development" culture ... foisting a preference contrary to someone's individual desire in this would cause harm to both her and the 30-year old man, in fact even more to him, because by the time the inevitable disaster played itself out he'd probably be pushing 40.
Lobster at July 29, 2010 7:32 AM
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