Too Young to Marry?

Dear Bro Jo,

Thanks so much for taking the time to read my letter. I'm a 19 year old at BYU-I approaching my third semester here.

I now have a boyfriend. He's an RM and we've been dating for two months now. We were good friends before we started dating. And now we're talking about marriage and he's meeting my family and all that stuff.

But I'm not sure, I think I love him, but what is love?

How do I know he's a good husband for me?

How do I know we're not just lusting after each other?

How do I know he'll be nice to me after we're married?

How do I know I'm ready for marriage?

I know I'm young and I've always given girls crap for getting married at my age, but I just can't push him away.

Anyways thanks for your help I really appreciate it.

- Too Young?


Dear Young,

Well, I guess what goes around comes around, eh?

Seen any Black Kettles, Sister Potts?

Been walking a mile in someone else’s moccasins?

(OK, ok, enough with the clichés . . .)


These are really great questions.

1. What is love? (“Baby don’t hurt me . . . “, careful, Bro Jo is in a very musical mood) Love is Simple. It’s putting others before you. That’s it. As Christ put our eternal salvation ahead of his life, when we put others first, their needs before our needs, we show that we love them. One of my favorite scriptures is “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (in fact, it’s that concept that gets me to cry in a movie, every time – bet you didn’t need to know that).

2. How do you know? (“How does she know you love her?” – I warned you)

a. First, review “Bro Jo’s FIVE A’s of WHY NOT TO GET MARRIED” (The Facebook link is HERE; the Original Column link is HERE; and check out Question # 5 on THIS letter). Put your feelings and infatuations aside, and see if he meets any of those criteria. If he does, get out of the relationship NOW. If you’re too close to the subject matter to judge accurately (and I think you probably are), ask a parent, sibling, Bishop or close friend to give you the honest truth.

b. Second, observe how he treats his family. Is he kind? Is he forgiving? Is he fun? Is he caring? Once the Honeymoon is over, he’s not likely to treat you any better than he treats them. If you haven’t seen him with his family, you’d better. If he has no family (none, zip, zero) the next one is even more important.

c. Third, try him out; do some Big Family Baby Sitting. Volunteer to watch the kids for a family you know (4+ kids are recommended, preferably of various ages). How is he with them? What does he say about the kids when they’re not around? Watching children so a couple can go on a get-a-way or to the Temple for several hours can be very enlightening.

d. Who is first in his life? Is it you? Is it him? Is it his car or hobby or favorite team? You can’t bet the rest of your life on the hope that he might change.

3. How do you differentiate between Lust and Love? (“Baby, baby, please let me hold him . . .”) Well, let me ask, can you go without it? Try making a deal where you both commit to no kissing for a week.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m a big advocate of kissing (that’s for YSAs and older, lest you High School and Youngers think I’m talking to you) and there’s nothing wrong with a little lust in your relationship (and in your marriage a lot of lust is a good thing, so long as it’s consensual and for each other), but see what is left of your relationship if you turn off the hormones for seven days.

When you give birth it’ll be No Sex for 4-6 weeks minimum, if you can’t keep your hands off of each other for one measly week now, you’ll never make it then. Bodies and Looks change, but Love is Forever.

4. How do you know he’ll stay nice? (“R-E-S-P-E-C-T, find out what it means to me . . .”) You have to take a step back and observe (see #2 above). How does he handle stress? Disappointment? Frustration? What does he do when he’s angry? Does he switch from Dr. Jekyll to Mr. Hyde in a flash? And this is VERY important: Does he scare you?

5. How do you know you’re ready? (“Are you ready? Yes I’m ready . . . to fall in love . . .) Well there are certain things in life for which nothing can truly prepare us. It’s a very short list. For example: no book, class, lecture, discussion, situation or scenario can prepare you for either parenthood or marriage. You have to live them to know.

(Bro Jo believes that’s at the core of why Living Together before Marriage is statistically worst thing you can do for your relationship. People think, or pretend, that such an arrangement will help them to be better prepared for marriage, but it doesn’t. The two things are just not the same.)

So you can never really know. What you can, and should, do is pray. Pray, pray, pray, pray, pray. The Spirit will comfort you and guide you in righteous decision making. Beyond that, set your emotions aside and look at the big picture logically; does it make Sense to marry this person? If you FEEL that it’s a bad idea, trust that.

And let me give you some unsolicited advice:

Talk.

A lot.

Before you two get sealed FOREVER, you need to know some pretty important things.

Where do you both want to live?

How many kids do you want?

When do you want to start having them?

How do you each define the roles of husband and wife?

What Holiday traditions are important to you?

What are your goal, hopes and dreams?

What are your priorities?

Will he always take care of you and will you always let him know you appreciate him?

(I can’t emphasize that last one enough)

You’re not going to agree on everything (Sister Jo will back me up on that), and you both need to recognize that people change, and not always in the way or at the time that we want them to.

An old adage goes like this: Men marry Women they hope won’t change and Women marry Men hoping they can change them; both are phenomenally wrong.

Ponder that.

And then ponder this: Nothing you ever do in life will be as important or can be as rewarding as being Sealed for Time and all Eternity in the House of the Lord. Nothing.

I love being married.

That doesn’t mean that every day is perfect.

But it does mean that I highly recommend it.

Thanks for Reading and Writing In; that’s why I’m here.

- Bro Jo

(P.S. In my never-humble-opinion, if the guy is right, 19 is NOT too young for an LDS woman to get Sealed in the Temple)