6 Things That Happen When You Get Engaged


Agreeing to marry the love of your life is, no doubt, one of the most special and magical moments of your entire life. Ahead lies a life together, a whole canvas of years just waiting for whatever you want to paint on them. The world is full of possibilities and there’s a huge amount of celebration and excitement to come. Wonderful as this is, there’s also the fact that it’s a pretty bizarre time. It’s exciting in the moment, but it’s also a period that many people associate with stress. After all, the moment you become engaged, the starting pistol is fired on the countdown to the wedding. As a result of all this change, there’s inevitably a few things that you learn about yourself during this time. Some of these realisations are pleasant, others are… more challenging to accept! But they’re all a part of the package that will lead to you becoming a wife, so embrace the good and the bad, and just try to enjoy the ride. 

1. You Discover You Care About The Little Things
We’re constantly told that we shouldn’t sweat the small stuff and that the little things are the things we can most afford to ignore… but sometimes? Sometimes, you really care about the little things. This is particularly true when you’re making decisions that you’re going to live with for the rest of your life. It can feel like the weight of making the right call for today, tomorrow, and 50 years from now, feels like it’s an unbearable burden. You will suddenly find yourself obsessing over making the “right choice” in ways you had never imagined yourself capable before. It’s no longer enough for you to head to glamira.co.uk and pick an engagement ring that you think is beautiful - oh no! You find yourself wondering if you’ll find it beautiful for the rest of your life, trying to predict what you’ll think when you glance down at it on your wrinkled and age-spotted fingers. Everything suddenly takes on a new level of gravitas. 

2. And Some Things, You Just Won’t Care About At All 
It’s impossible to predict what those things will be; they are unique to every soon-to-be bride. However, it’s somewhat inevitable that you’ll find that you just plain don’t care about some aspects of your wedding. Maybe it’ll be the invitations, the place settings, or even the flowers - whatever it is, you’ll find yourself trying to get excited and have an opinion, only to find a big load of nothing when you try to care. This is completely normal. It has a tendency to spook some brides as they feel they should obsessively care about every intricate detail, so why are they suddenly feeling so blasé about certain aspects? The simple fact is, it’s not possible to give the same level of attention to detail to everything - something’s got to give! 

3. You’ll Get Bored Of Telling Your Engagement Story 
Whether your engagement story was a quick chat after a standard evening meal or an elaborate proposal worthy of YouTube.com, everyone has their own story of engagement to tell. When you first get engaged, you will retell this as often as you are asked, loving being able to share the moment with your nearest and dearest… until you get to the point where you’re fed up of saying it. By the 100th time, you’ll find yourself skipping over details. No longer do you excitedly describe how things came to the big moment; you’ll prefer brevity and a simple “and then he asked and I said yes”. Fortunately, your love of the most romantic moment of your life (to date, anyway) will return when you have a break from telling the story for awhile! 

4. You’ll Get All Romantic 
There’s nothing like an engagement to sweep away all cynicism from your mindset. When you get engaged, you’ll be surprised to discover that you no longer roll your eyes at the mention of romance and “happily ever after” - you’ll willingly indulge in it, seek it out. Engagement is such a romantic time, even amidst all the stress. You’re planning to spend your life with someone, and you’re working together to create a day that will seal your union for good. If you had a romantic soul beforehand then it will be amplified; if you were somewhat cynical, then you’ll find yourself “aah”ing at things only a few weeks prior you would have dismissed as cheesy. Embrace it! 

5. You’ll Find Yourself Curious About Other People’s Stories 
Now you have your own engagement story, you’ll find yourself unspeakably curious about how other people came to be engaged. It’s lovely to be able to share in their joy and see how they felt, learn from their experience. So go ahead and ask your friends and family about how they got engaged - provided they’ve had some time to be happy to talk about it again! Not only that, but you’ll also start to wonder about how strangers got engaged. It’s completely normal to have this level of curiosity, so indulge yourself with a few Googling sessions to find the good, the bad, and the ugly of romantic tales out there. 

6. You'll Discover That Your Real Life Doesn’t Go Away
Given all of the above - the romance, the focus, the anticipation of the big day - it can be tempting to see engagement as a one-way street of enjoyment and excitement. It can therefore be a little disappointing to realise that all your stresses and concerns of normal life still exist. That colleague that annoys you or the roadworks that are taking too long - they’re still going to drive you mad, which doesn’t quite seem fair given what you have to look forward to. Nevertheless, deep breaths, and let them wash off of you. Engagement is a magical time, so enjoy it as much as you can - just don’t expect it to cure you of all of life’s ills!