On Marrying Young: Reflections from a Newlywed

I've been hoping Emily would write a post for the On Marrying Young series for quite some time now.  We've been blog friends for a long time now (and have real life connections through a friend of mine who was Emily's friend - and is now her sister-in-law!).  I've been counting down the months, weeks, and days until her wedding.  Now that she's officially tied the knot at a "young" age, she's put down her story for me.  Thanks so much, Emily! 

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My husband Jim and I were married on a beautiful, sunny day a little over 2 months ago on May 4. I am 22 and he was 23 at the time. Obviously, that is considered "young" in today's day and age where most people wait several years to get married. 

We were engaged our senior year in college. I was 20 and he was 22. When we got engaged, most people asked us if we were planning on waiting several years to get married. They asked us if we were going to live together after graduating and try it out for a few years before tying the knot. Our answer was simple, no! We weren't going to live together, and we certainly weren't planning on waiting several years to get married. We were both very adamant about living apart until we were married.

While we originally planned our wedding to be November of 2012, disagreements and arguments with parents led us to our May 4 wedding. While I very well know that we could've made the decision to stick with the November wedding, we appreciated the help that our parents gave for waiting a few more months. We definitely didn't plan on having a 20+ month engagement at the time. However, having a little extra time to save up money proved to be very nice. We were even able to put a down payment on a house a few months before our wedding that Jim lived in until May.

We were lucky. We both had jobs right out of college, had a bit of money saved up (since I worked full time during college), and were able to buy a house before our wedding. But, I don't think any of those things are necessary. We were very careful to budget everything out before spending money on the wedding and on our house. We had an Excel sheet where we calculated every little thing we'd have to spend money on monthly and ensured that we would be able to afford everything. I think this proved to our parents that we were already working together financially and were ready to take the next step together. 

Just after we started dating

It was terrible the year after graduation living apart from Jim. We were used to seeing each other daily in college and the transition from daily hanging out to weekly was tough. We were lucky that we were able to see each other weekly but it was still very hard! I was in a new place, in a new job, with absolutely no friends. I only wish I could have had Jim by my side during that time because it was definitely a struggle.  I didn't want to wait a year after college to get married. I couldn't even imagine waiting several years! I don't think it's necessary to wait when you are both committed to marriage. I love the fact that I can go through all of my life experiences with Jim by my side. I can come home to him and know that there is always a smiling face and a loving husband to come home to. 

We were the first couple of our friends to get married. It was awkward at first because most of our friends are single, and some even live with their significant others. Would our relationships with our friends change after we got married? Would it be significantly different with our relationship? How would they treat us? Thankfully, nothing really changed with our friends. We're still the nerdy gamer couple who hangs out at night online with their gamer friends from college :)

I'm glad that we were married when we were. Sure, we're young. We have a lot of time to get to know each other even better and go through life together. I am so blessed that I met Jim early in life, but I will never think that you need to wait to get married. I was always told, when you know.. you know. That is completely true of Jim and I am so glad that I am able to finally call him my husband! 

                

Emily is a newly-converted Catholic and newlywed living in Ohio. She enjoys running, watching sports, baking, finding new recipes to cook for her new husband, and talking about fashion and faith over at Fine Linen and Purple. 

Thanks, Emily!  Please check out the other posts in my On Marrying Young series.