It is no secret that marriage is a huge commitment, and most people never think about second marriages. Depending on who you choose as your spouse, your marriage can be beautiful or ugly. Choosing a man to marry will make or break the woman you become so this choice is truly one of the most important decisions of your life. One of the best ways to prevent divorce is to be very intentional and to do your homework before you marry. Do you know what you really like? For instance, do you enjoy spending time at home and consider yourself a homebody or are you an adventure seeker and adrenaline junkie? Do you appreciate quality time with your partner, or do you appreciate time apart to miss each other? At the bare minimum, it is a good idea to understand what you like so you can easily spot what you don’t like in a potential mate and not choose the man who lives a life that you are not compatible with. In this article, we will provide insight into the things to pay attention to when choosing a lifelong mate to ultimately have your last happy marriage.

Before committing yourself to someone, the first thing to determine is whether you know yourself on a deep level. Most people’s default answer to this question is, yes. However, knowing yourself goes beyond being able to explain why your favorite food is spicy rigatoni and why your political views are what they are. Knowing yourself takes more work than reciting the things you like and rattling off all of your accomplishments and recent travel. When thinking about who would be the right mate for you, knowing yourself is the first step to successfully choosing him. If someone asked you right now, who are you? What would your response be? The answer to this question is much harder than one may think.

The best way to start crafting a truthful and authentic answer to this question is to think about your personality traits. Are you creative, warm, sultry, health conscious, family oriented, friendly, or loyal? You can even take it a step further and ask close friends and family how they would describe you and incorporate some of their responses. The next step is to think about your values. Your values are the things that are important to you, the things that drive you in life. It is important to know what your values are so you can build a lifestyle around your values so life is more meaningful and satisfying. Are you someone who values family, balance, good health, learning, integrity, gratitude, growth, passion, etc.?  Once you understand who you are and your character, separate and apart from the possessions you have and what you have accomplished, you truly know yourself. A partner who values the same things you value will allow for better compatibility. When people say opposites attract they are not talking about core values.

Knowing the life you want to live is also critical when deciding on a future partner because you want to make sure you and your future mate are on the same page about what you both want out of life. Do you want children in the future? Are you a pet person? Is traveling important to you? What about where you live? Are you a suburb or city kind of person? The best thing is to figure this all out before you agree to commit to someone because resentment can grow if you and your future partner are not on the same page.

Revisit Your Childhood to Determine Your Relationship Needs

In an ideal world, everyone would come from perfect parents and have had a perfect childhood. We are not saying that those people don’t exist, but therapists would not be in such a demand if this were the case. People are not perfect and there is no rule book for parenting. Although most of us are a long way from our childhoods, discovering your relationship needs starts with revisiting your childhood because the things that you did not receive from your parents are what you will need from your future partner. According to clinical psychologist Rebecca Bergen, Ph. D., your childhood experiences with your parents will give you a model for your adult relationships, whether the model is good or bad.

Some of the core things children need from their parents are basic life skills (financial literacy, hygiene, etc.), consistency, dependability, unconditional love, attention, encouragement, protection, and respect. We suggest starting with this list of needs and giving yourself a score of 1-10, 10 being the best, as to how much this need was fulfilled during your childhood by your parents. For example, for the need respect did your parents respect your feelings? Were you allowed to express your feelings and be heard for them? If you no longer wanted to play a sport or you didn’t like a specific comment or tone of voice your parent(s) had with you and you voiced that to them, did they respect your boundary? Go through each need and assign a number to each based on your recollection of your experience as a child. Once you have completed assigning a number to each need, the lowest 3-5 needs will be imperative for you to have met in your adult relationship.  So, if you gave your parents a low score in the respect category because of their lack of respecting your boundaries, you will need a partner who respects your boundaries when you set them.

Non-Negotiables + Deal Breakers

Non-negotiables are the things that are very important for you to have in a spouse. For example, intelligence, safety, financial stability, religion, health, generosity, politics, etc. Deal breakers, on the other hand, are things that you are willing to end your commitment over. For example, domestic violence, physical violence, cheating, addiction, drug abuse, intolerance, long distance, etc.  Non-negotiables and deal breakers are different for each person. When considering the perfect match for you, it is important to know what your non-negotiables and deal breakers are, express them to your potential mate, and listen to the non-negotiables and deal breakers of your potential mate.

Marriage Vision

Thanks to Disney and Hallmark, most women have envisioned their wedding since age 13 and it probably mirrors a scene from their favorite Disney moving as a little girl. The problem is, Disney is nothing like real life and those same women who live in this fantasy don’t spend much time envisioning their marriage. A wedding will last one day and your marriage, we hope, will last a lifetime. So, it is best to come up with your vision for your wedding and your marriage so you can choose the lucky man to be a part of that vision. Your own marriage is whatever you want it to be. We suggest incorporating as many of your core values into your marriage vision so you are setting your future family up for success. Some examples of what a marriage vision looks like are you and your husband having a date night once a week and going on a romantic holiday to celebrate your anniversary.  These moments would be key for a couple that values romance. For the couple that values balance and stability, deciding how household chores will be done, the expected financial contribution of each spouse, household spending, the level of involvement with extended family members, and how will you deal with his overly-attached mother are key for including in your vision. If having children is important to you and your future spouse, is the vision that you start trying for children right away or after a few years? Will you add pets to the family?

Go Through Each Relationship Phase

Relationship expert and best-selling author, Dr. Patricia Allen says there are four phases of a relationship: the Perfect Phase, the Imperfect Phase, the Negotiation Phase, and the Commitment Phase.

The Perfect Phase consists of the first 1-3 months of a relationship where you feel like you have finally met Prince Charming, and you have your rose-colored glasses on (aka the honeymoon phase). In this phase, you are to assess whether the two of you have chemistry, compatibility, and great communication. During this phase, it will be challenging to fairly evaluate your potential partner because this is the time when everything about him will be endearing and charming. It will be difficult for you to see any flaws. With time you will reveal more about yourself and so will he.

The Imperfect Phase consists of months 3-6 of the relationship where the rose-colored glasses come off and you start to see the imperfections in your potential husband, and he begins to see yours. During this phase, you want to state what your non-negotiables and deal breakers are and learn what his non-negotiables and deal breakers are. What are some things that you don’t like about him? What are some things that he has expressed that he doesn’t particularly like about you? During this phase, once you both clearly state your non-negotiables, deal-breakers, and characteristics you may not love about one another, Pat Allen suggests you either accept him, reject him, or tolerate him. In Pat’s best-selling book, Getting to I Do (link to library), she goes more in depth about the process you should go through to determine whether you should accept, reject, or tolerate him.

The Negotiation Phase happens during the 6-9 month mark of the relationship. In this phase, together you will, assuming you both chose to accept each other in the Imperfect Phase, begin negotiating things that will make your lives easier as a couple. It’s important to negotiate things before issues arise so a resolution can occur as swiftly as possible. For example, when you two marry will it be a religious or civil ceremony? Do you both want children? If so, how many? What religion will the family practice? How will childcare be handled? Will you live in a city or a rural area? This is the phase, where you two decide on the landscape of the relationship. The Negotiation Phase is not about the small stuff or that little thing you two might disagree about. This phase is really about discussing the inevitable decisions you will have to make down the line as a couple, and family should you so choose.  

The Commitment Phase consists of months 9-12.  This is a delicate period in the relationship and the time when you both get to put your negotiations into practice. It is also during this phase when a marriage time frame is negotiated. 

Vet Him With Other Trustworthy Men

Many young women have one or several wise men that they trust who can vet their potential spouse. You want to introduce your potential husband to be to those men that you unequivocally trust, know you well, and are good examples of husbands in their own marriages. Allow these trustworthy men to really experience your potential mate and permit them enough time to assess him and get back to you with their thoughts. Assuming you receive unwavering support from them, you will feel comfort in knowing that the men in your life that you hold in high regard approve of your potential husband and he is the real deal for you.

Couples Counseling

Therapy or counseling is always a great idea, especially when it can prevent divorce. The national marriage and divorce rates show a declined rate in marriages and divorce in 2021, specifically, the divorce rate dropped to 6.9% in the last year from 9.7% divorces per 1,000 women in 2011. The trick to marriage counseling is to not seek the assistance of a marriage counselor’s attempt at helping to facilitate fixing a marriage after the marriage is broken. When a marriage therapist attempts to resolve marital issues, the likelihood of success is higher when issues are addressed earlier on than after time has passed the resentment and negative emotions have had time to fester. When considering your future spouse, ask him if he is open to marriage therapy should you two ever need it because a successful marriage therapist can save a couple from deep heartache.

Final Thoughts

Getting married for the second time is not a bad thing. Most ladies obtain a great level of wisdom after their previous marriage ends and will tell you that they wish they would have chosen their second husband first. We hope the information in this article will save you a lot of time when considering men for marriage. For the ladies who have been married before, never underestimate your own advice and the wisdom you gained from your first marriage. This time your eyes are wide open and there are fewer things that are likely to come from left field because you’ve been there and done that. This article is meant to be a guide, not the gospel. We know each woman approaches her relationship in unique ways that ultimately work well for her. For the ladies who have never been married and are considering marriage for the first time with someone special, this article can serve as your guide to getting there successfully.