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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]For those of you who married in your 20s and have been married--to the same person--for at least ten years, how's it going?  What's good, not so good?  Would you do it again, knowing what you know now?[/quote]

Marrying in your 20's is the norm.  Why would this be something to ask about?  It's like asking "Driving at 16, How'd that work out?"[/quote]

Actually, I'd say that marrying at 30 is now the norm for affluent, college-educated women.  My source:  the NYT wedding announcements, my kids' friends and my friends' kids (super-scientific, I know).   That said, I agree with those who note that there's a big difference between marrying in late 20s and early 20s.  I was married in late 20s and have been married (mostly quite happily for 30 years).  Anecdotally (again), I can remember quite a few of those  right after college marriages falling apart -- they just seemed like life rafts going under, whereas couples marrying even a few years later have mostly hung in there.  I think those first few years after college are a period of real emotional growth for most people, so a late 20s marriage will stand a better change of surviving.  [/quote]

NP here.  I'm inclined to agree with much of this.  However, as a college-educated Millennial, I can tell you that most of the marriages I'm seeing among 28 year olds are between college sweethearts who cohabitated for a long time.  That is to say, these marriages are generally not between people who dated freely for most of their 20s, met someone at 26 and got married at 28.  Economic forces are generally pushing couples to cohabit much sooner than they would otherwise be willing to in prior generations, so many of these relationships I think move quicker than they probably should.  Anecdotally, I find that these couples end up with highly integrated lives (duh, 'cause they're living together) and seem to basically slide into marriage over the course of many years, rather than actively and affirmatively *decide* on a person.

Like all marriages, I think time will tell how these marriages work out.  Half these people I know don't even seem like newlyweds by the time they're walking down the aisle.  I've also seen many of these long-time couples end up with serious issues once their first is born, because it so shakes up the very low-stress, undemanding dynamic in which they become very entrenched (boozy brunches! weekend trips! avocado toast!).[/quote]

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