[Aloysius]

tOne - well the 1st relationship (the 5-year) was freshman year of high school through freshman year of college. We broke up cause we were young and also long distance (went to different colleges). I will take this opportunity to recommend not getting into something so serious when you're that young. We're currently still close and good friends.

2nd one is more relevant to your question. (I'm 31 btw.) We started dating middle of undergrad and stayed together through our 20s. This was the one on the verge of marriage. Our circle of friends were rather shocked when we broke up.

We both took marriage very seriously (her parents were divorced, I just take everything seriously haha), and so were very careful about not rushing into an engagement.

By the time she, in earnest, began the whole "where's my ring where's my ring" push, it became clear to me that 1) I wasn't ready for marriage; 2) issues I had ignored because she was so awesome in other ways, I started to factor more rationally into why or why not she would be a good wife. It was a very difficult decision to break things off with her.

So to your question: I actually think alot of people in our situation would've fallen prey to the standard momentum of long-term couples getting engaged than married in their mid to late 20s. I'm glad we didn't. I think I fortunately had the perspective (this is more true for a guy I think) that I had a long window to find my wife (no need to "settle"), but more critically, I had some growing up to do in the interim.

-Al