My wife and I had a very traditional courtship in part because she was 15 when we met and couldn't date yet. What this did was allow us time to really get to know each other outside of the normal dating scene. For me, it was love at first sight and for almost a year our courtship was made up of long talks on the phone and weekends spent with her family and later with mine when she went to church with me and my family on Sunday.
What this allowed was that we became fast friends long before we became lovers. We have now been married for 45 years and counting and 3 years of going steady. I can honestly say that we have never had any regrets and our friendship has only grown. So many young people get married so fast and then when they get to know the person that they are now living with and tied to is someone that they really don't like very much out of bed.
The real losers in so many of these situations are the kids that they should never have had. Even after our three years dating and going together, we waited 5 years before we started a family. That allowed us time to be well established before adding the chaos that a child will add to any relationship. Kids are just there for a few years our love and friendship is and was for LIFE and we always had each others back and came first. That said we must not have been too hard on our Daughter she and her partner by choice moved in beside us to raise her Daughter with us and we live as one family in two houses.
