Im going to state something very bluntly and I hope you don't take personal offense. If you marry her expect for your general public opinion of yourself to go way down instantly. Co workers, friends, family, social circles you've had for years...EVERYONE will think less of you. I am not saying its fair but its the truth.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'd also be curious to know if she would even be ready for marriage- by her own admission, not an outside judgement from DCUM. I know that I was madly in love with my college BF and that I wanted to marry him. If he had asked I would have said NO WAY when I was just out of school!. FWIW, we actually did get married at about 28, but I just knew I wasn't ready at that young age.

OP here: She has told me that she wants to get married and more to the point that she would like to marry me. We have discussed waiting until graduation though. I'm an quite circumspect about this however.

What is her relationship with her father?

OP: She is quite deferential to him.

Being cheated on.

It could be that she's avoiding having to support herself and make life decisions on her own. Graduating from college is a tough time, it's daunting for a lot of people and completely understandable if she sees you as an easier path to tread.

How are her career prospects? Business major, or art history?

Let's say you guys are truly soul mates and it's meant to be. There will still be backlash from your peers (think of how the age appropriate wives of your male friends will treat her).

Is she emotionally mature enough to have that roll off her back? Are you ready to have to defend her to all of your friends, or cut off those relationships because she can't handle the way they treat her? Most 20 year-olds are not prepared for that, and I doubt she's much different.

Anonymous wrote:I think a 20 year age difference is less of a red flag than her wanting to get married at 20. You have had a whole adult life, she has never lived alone, never had to support herself or handle any sort of adult issues. I cannot imagine going from sharing the dorm showers to being someone's wife. Wait until she's a few years out of school and if you both feel the same way, awesome! One benefit of her being young is that she will still presumedly be fertile for another 15-20 years so no need to rush to have kids. Honestly at this point you'll be an older dad either way, better to wait for her sake than rush into it.

This. To me the concerns are more about her wanting you to create a role for her (wife/mother) rather than her being focused on life after college and what she wants to do.

Wait until she graduates. I have a feeling the pressure she puts on you will increase as her own life decisions need to be made post-graduation and you'll see the writing on the wall for yourself.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'd also be curious to know if she would even be ready for marriage- by her own admission, not an outside judgement from DCUM. I know that I was madly in love with my college BF and that I wanted to marry him. If he had asked I would have said NO WAY when I was just out of school!. FWIW, we actually did get married at about 28, but I just knew I wasn't ready at that young age.

OP here: She has told me that she wants to get married and more to the point that she would like to marry me. We have discussed waiting until graduation though. I'm an quite circumspect about this however.

What is her relationship with her father?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, what do you think she sees in you? At her age I never would have given a 40 y.o. a second look, frankly, so I'm curious. You need to have a very, very strong connection to make such an age gap work these days, and she is so very young to really know her own heart and mind. If you really love her, I would hope you would give her lots of time to make sure she's making the right decision.

OP here: Yes. I’ve pondered that one myself. When I’ve asked her about that there are three themes that I’ve been able to identify. (1) She states that she likes that I’m “serious.” I take that to means that she appreciates that I’m serious-minded or thoughtful. (2) She states that she feels comfortable with me and “safe.” (3) She says that, in retrospect, she is able to distinguish a distinct improvement in how I approach and treat her compared to past relationships. These are reasons outside of the physical attraction arena.

These all scream "father figure" to me.

+1. OP, when a woman that much younger tells you that you make her feel "safe," she is really saying that she is not confident in herself and her decisions (probably because of the past failures in relationships you mentioned) and you are ... easy. She doesn't think she's going to have to work as hard to keep you interested in her and she doesn't fear that you will leave her. That's a nice thing, I guess, but I also think that it is based on "feeling safe with daddy" rather than feeling like she has built your respect and trust as an adult.

I'd be very careful with this. You could end up broke and very hurt.

+1

OP, despite not being a woman, you do run the risk to run out of time to have a family you desire. I'd seriously reconsider.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, what do you think she sees in you? At her age I never would have given a 40 y.o. a second look, frankly, so I'm curious. You need to have a very, very strong connection to make such an age gap work these days, and she is so very young to really know her own heart and mind. If you really love her, I would hope you would give her lots of time to make sure she's making the right decision.

OP here: Yes. I’ve pondered that one myself. When I’ve asked her about that there are three themes that I’ve been able to identify. (1) She states that she likes that I’m “serious.” I take that to means that she appreciates that I’m serious-minded or thoughtful. (2) She states that she feels comfortable with me and “safe.” (3) She says that, in retrospect, she is able to distinguish a distinct improvement in how I approach and treat her compared to past relationships. These are reasons outside of the physical attraction arena.

These all scream "father figure" to me.

+1. OP, when a woman that much younger tells you that you make her feel "safe," she is really saying that she is not confident in herself and her decisions (probably because of the past failures in relationships you mentioned) and you are ... easy. She doesn't think she's going to have to work as hard to keep you interested in her and she doesn't fear that you will leave her. That's a nice thing, I guess, but I also think that it is based on "feeling safe with daddy" rather than feeling like she has built your respect and trust as an adult.

I'd be very careful with this. You could end up broke and very hurt.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, what do you think she sees in you? At her age I never would have given a 40 y.o. a second look, frankly, so I'm curious. You need to have a very, very strong connection to make such an age gap work these days, and she is so very young to really know her own heart and mind. If you really love her, I would hope you would give her lots of time to make sure she's making the right decision.

OP here: Yes. I’ve pondered that one myself. When I’ve asked her about that there are three themes that I’ve been able to identify. (1) She states that she likes that I’m “serious.” I take that to means that she appreciates that I’m serious-minded or thoughtful. (2) She states that she feels comfortable with me and “safe.” (3) She says that, in retrospect, she is able to distinguish a distinct improvement in how I approach and treat her compared to past relationships. These are reasons outside of the physical attraction arena.

Honestly, none of these are really about YOU. They are about your maturity. Guys her age are immature, so you are obviously more mature than them, and treat her better. But that's not going to be enough, long-term, because all of those guys will grow up over the next 5 years or so, and still have more in common with her.

Do you have kids from a previous relationship? Is this a "second-time-around" situation? If so, how would she deal with having "step grandchildren" the same age as her own kids? Is she emotionally mature enough to handle that fallout?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What does she want in the future? Kids? The social dynamics are very weird. Most adults still hang out with adults of roughly the same age. People will make assumptions about you and most of them are not positive. Get used to waiters assuming she's out with her dad.

I have a good friend whose parents had a 20+ year age gap. The parents seemed socially isolated and her mother had to basically stop her life for years to take care of her father.

I can see what's in it for you, but I can't see what's in it for your partner...

He must be very wealthy .. Otherwise why would she be interested

OP here.... oddly enough over the past few years of I've found the older women I've dated (38 +) to be more overtly interested in money. Frequently point blank asking questions about annual income, net worth (including balance in retirement accounts and savings accounts), etc. I've found it somewhat disturbing at times.

Hear me out, OP:

By the time women reach mid-30s and are still unmarried, but are looking to marry men their age or a little older, their dating pool is essentially much, much narrower than it was when they were 20 (or even throughout their 20s). A lot of marriageable guys are taken at that point. I could see a variety of reasons that you'd get more overt questions about money from 38+ women:

1. They are total duds (hey, they haven't been chosen by a partner yet, either).
2. They are gunshy because they are worried about the quality of guys who haven't been married at 40 and need extra reassurance.
3. They have successful careers and want an equal partner and a financially savvy man who isn't deeply in debt or living in his parents' basement.
4. They have experienced the hell of living with a wasteful partner and don't want to get stuck like that.
5. They don't want to beat around the bush and find out slowly what your situation is because they don't have much time left if they want to have children.

So, I don't think the fact that 38+ women are asking about money makes the golddiggers in all but the first scenario. But if you're attracting/dating a lot of 38+ women who are duds (explicit questions about net worth rather than, say, tactfully asking about your job and general lifestyle), then you might want to ask yourself why. Certainly, I'd be asking myself why I could only attract naive 20-year-olds or gold-digging 40-year-olds if I were you.

There must be more to this....meaning:

Is she outgoing and social? I cannot imagine a 20 year old with a great social life and family life doing this.

Are you with someone with poor self esteem and they want to settle.

My niece was with a man twice her age. She left when he declined sexually and she wanted to have fun with those her age. She felt he was stealing her youth.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, what do you think she sees in you? At her age I never would have given a 40 y.o. a second look, frankly, so I'm curious. You need to have a very, very strong connection to make such an age gap work these days, and she is so very young to really know her own heart and mind. If you really love her, I would hope you would give her lots of time to make sure she's making the right decision.

OP here: Yes. I’ve pondered that one myself. When I’ve asked her about that there are three themes that I’ve been able to identify. (1) She states that she likes that I’m “serious.” I take that to means that she appreciates that I’m serious-minded or thoughtful. (2) She states that she feels comfortable with me and “safe.” (3) She says that, in retrospect, she is able to distinguish a distinct improvement in how I approach and treat her compared to past relationships. These are reasons outside of the physical attraction arena.

compared to her past relationships?

She sounds terrified of something. How is her relationship with her parents?

If her past relationships were all with guys the same age as her, then of course she thinks you're "serious". It's not that hard to out-serious a 19-year-old.

Are your parents still living, OP? Does she truly understand what it will be like to help you care for them, and then care for you AND her own aging parents at the same time, eventually?

Anonymous wrote:I think a 20 year age difference is less of a red flag than her wanting to get married at 20. You have had a whole adult life, she has never lived alone, never had to support herself or handle any sort of adult issues. I cannot imagine going from sharing the dorm showers to being someone's wife. Wait until she's a few years out of school and if you both feel the same way, awesome! One benefit of her being young is that she will still presumedly be fertile for another 15-20 years so no need to rush to have kids. Honestly at this point you'll be an older dad either way, better to wait for her sake than rush into it.

Agree with this. Not sure what the rush is other than perhaps her not wanting to live on her own and to be taken care of. Agree to be serious for a couple years while she lives on her own and see what happens. How long have you been together?