Guys, I’m really scared about this… Not sure if this belongs in this thread, but I’ve been engaged to a girl I don’t even know…
I traveled with my mom to my native country in eastern Europe with the intention of meeting this girl my relatives have matched me with. A couple of days ago, I met this girl, and after my relatives chatted with her relatives, I was given a chance to be with her privately for a few minutes. I did most of the talking, saying things very brokenly in my native language that I’m not very fluent in. I decided to give her a fair shake and just before leaving we were told that they would call us to let us know if her parents are okay with us being a thing.
…Well apparently, the way a “thing” works in these parts is you get engaged with them right away… No getting to know one another first, no building a romantic affiliation, no boyfriend/girlfriend relationship, nope, just straight to being engaged. Just having any interest in wanting to pursue anything with one another is enough for there to be a wedding soon…
I really don’t like the way this is being handled at all with how fast I’m being spearheaded into this, and yet everyone in my family is congratulating me, feeling proud of me and saying that I’m the luckiest guy in the world…which makes me feel very alone with my feelings with this in that I’m reluctant to tell them how I really feel…because how the hell do you tell people like that that you’re not happy?
Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against the girl; the fact I don’t know her could also mean that she could very well be a decent girl for me. However, I don’t want kids in my future…like, at all. This is a major problem since every female in my culture are very enthusiastic about children so this is likely to be a dealbreaker for the girl and if the engagement gets called off for that reason, I’m doomed to be made to feel like total shit by my relatives…who are all too happy about me finally getting married since I’m already 35.
See, in my culture it’s considered really, really weird to not get married and everyone marries young; my family feels that I’m getting too old and I’ll miss my chance at marriage. I’m not being given the freedom to deviate from my culture. This is just “something I have to do” and I’ve been secretly fighting it for a long time. I certainly would like to have a female companion in my life, but…not like this…
I’m meeting this girl again in a couple of days, this time I’ll be staying at a place closer to where she lives so I can get to know her more. Sure, it’d be nice to get to know here more (which is what should have taken place before they decided to shoehorn the engagement arrangements), but I just can’t shake the feeling this is a disaster waiting to happen…
I just…don’t know what to do… I’m freaking out… Help…