quote:
Originally posted by mabelle:
[qb]i won't comment too much on the pre-nup thing because i know the person i'm going to marry inside and out, and i would probably wait until i am absolutely sure and free of doubt about our future together.[/qb]
Again, I can only say that I was completely sure. I'm a very careful, practical person who tends to do research and get lots of facts. I'm logical more than emotional mostly, I'm normally a good judge of character, and see through people. But I was horribly fooled, and evidently on purpose. He was passing himself off as someone he was not... I think he was believing his own press, as they say, and I fell for the act.
I was so sure I knew him inside and out... goals, fears, beliefs, issues, flaws, positive traits. And I only knew half of him. Over time, I got to know both of him

and ended up liking neither as they were both abusive. But I look back, and I think how sure I was that this was the right man, the perfect man, and I knew him like nobody else did. Now I know I do, but only because I'm the lucky person who got shown both sick sides.
I don't want to put anybody down or act like I don't believe that someone can know someone else because I do. I still believe in love and long-term relationships. But 50% of people are wrong about who they marry (at least once

), and I just want people to have thought every possibility through. You think through possibities of death and you get a will and life insurance, of accidents or poor health and you get health insurance, and you enter into a legal contract when you get married. Seriously, it is a legal contract, so why not have a 2nd legal contract! And it doesn't have to wring someone dry, it can just say what I wish mine said: my things are mine, his are his, and joint assets or debt are split 50/50. Most people wish they could have more than 50%... I WISH I could have that and my own things back, things I owned before I met him.
Consider the possibility that for whatever reason, it may not work out. Wouldn't you want both of you protected in that case? If you agree on things, put it in writing. If you don't need it, you can look back in 75 years and smile at how you agreed then and agree now. If you need it, you will be so awfully hurt and sad that you needed it and didn't have it. Same as insurance. You hope you never need it, but you get it anyway... and the day you need it, you are happy you have it. If you never need it, you say how great that I had it just in case and how lucky I am to have not needed it.
Sorry again to go on, but it's awful and painful to be so wrong about someone when you put so much love and good intention into it. It's like a bad soap opera where the bad guy is charming everybody. It's sick stuff and people get fooled, and hopefully my story is an extreme. But the stats are what they are, and with so many people having separations and divorce, I think when considering all future possibilities, consider that one too.
I know why nobody wants to and dismisses what I'm saying, but remember that you're mapping your future. I only wish someone had sat me down, asked me to look at things, and get a pre-nup. If he had balked, I'd know there were something off. And if he went for it, I wouldn't have a single problem right now with getting my things or having him help pay the debt he rang up in my name. I don't want anybody else to go through this, and I can only ask that instead of just dismissing what I'm saying because love is perfect and you know everything this person is now and you somehow know everything this person will ever be in the future that you just think about it quietly a bit. Everybody changes and evolves, and who knows who any of us will be in five years! What if...
Saying it out of love and care for you guys,
Deb