Dating someone eight years older than you
This seems like a bad idea.
Compromising and settling down on her schedule, is a recipe for dissatisfaction on your part. When you factor in the different ways in which men and women age, I just think you should think very carefully about making big commitments with this woman. I'm in a relationship like this, but apart from a similar age difference, most of our other circumstances are completely different, with the most important differences being that neither of us wants children and we never had to do a long-distance relationship.
It sounds like you've got a lot of things to think about and a lot of potential issues, but I don't think that the age difference is the major one except in the fact that she sees it as possibly having an effect on your willingness to commit for the long term. I know a couple with almost exactly your age gap who were married at around your ages, perhaps seven years ago now, at a time when she had a serious case of Ticking Clock. They have two lovely kids and seem very happy.
Both of them are religious people who take marriage and commitment very very seriously; that may help to mitigate any age gap problems. I know couples who are decades apart and doing fine, and last month I watched two of my friends break up their long term relationships where their boyfriends were within a year of each other.
The Pros and Cons of Dating a Younger Man
Saying "forever" at twenty-three is tough- but it's not like it hasn't happened before. If you want it, go for it. My brother-in-law married a woman 13 years his senior almost 20 years ago. They're still together and happy. But the relationships in which I've personally seen it work usually involve adding about fifteen years to both of your ages. The difference between 23 and 31 is a lot bigger than the difference between 38 and Even so, the standard rule says half-your-age-plus-seven, and you're right at the lower limit of that for her. The reason is that, as you've noted, you're not really done coming into yourself as an adult yet, and she, even if she hasn't finished that process, is way, way further along than you are.
If you were 33 and she were 41, even though there'd still be the same age difference, at that point you'd have been on your own, as an adult, making your own decisions and leading your own life, for more than a decade.
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Right now, you've just finished school. All of that being said, each relationship is unique, and lemme tell you, the problems you're talking about here are far from the largest problems I've seen people deal with. Any two people can, theoretically, have a healthy, positive relationship, if both approach it with the right attitude and the situation otherwise permits.
So yeah, the age thing is a red flag, but I'm not aware of any relationship that doesn't have any red flags. Best friend and good friend - she is in her late thirties, he is in his late twenties.
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They have been together for several years, live together and seem likely to stay together - it's a serious relationship in which both seem very happy. She had dated a lot before this relationship; he had dated less. Funnily enough, my best friend grew up in a less stable family and has had to work through a lot of stuff about men, commitment, etc. I've known some other folks who have had these types of relationships, but most were long-term-not-permanent - ie, your standard youngish adult several-year relationships where, although marriage had not been ruled out, it was not a priority for either person.
These relationships were like any other relationship; the age difference didn't seem like a big thing. Eight years really isn't that much if you're at similar places in life, but twenty-three is pretty young.
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Are you in general a serious and focused person who is ready for a family? When you meet other attractive women, do you seriously consider them as prospects even semi-consciously or do you just notice that they're attractive the way everyone does? What are your relations with the other women in your life?
How heavily do you weight youth and appearance in general? Are you freaked out by the idea of growing old? Do you have friends who are older than you? How big a deal is appearance? Again, the guys who have the most successful long-term relationships are guys for whom emotional and intellectual compatibility are the more important parts of a relationship - they're physically attracted to their partners, but in general they need emotional and intellectual compatibility in order to want to have a serious relationship - in their past dating lives, they were not drawn to beautiful but stupid women, or beautiful women with diametrically opposite values to theirs.
Do you - even semi-consciously - rely on your partner as a source of status? Do you feel like you need to have a beautiful woman on your arm to be at ease with other men? No matter how lovely your partner is, if you're this type of guy you will one day be in a situation where it's high-status to have a much younger partner. Will you still care for your current partner at that point, or will you want to replace her so that you can fit in?
These are some things I'd ask myself. If you have a history of knowing yourself and making good decisions, and if you feel confident in your heart, I don't think age is a serious concern. My former supervisor was 7 years older than her husband, who moved from western Canada to Connecticut to marry her they met on vacation in the Bahamas and did the long-distance relationship for a couple years. They have no kids she married in her mids, I think, and felt she was "too old" to have them but they have lots of nieces and nephews and pets.
I don't think the age difference is a problem. I do think her failure to commit to you is a problem. Perhaps she fears the age difference as she says - or perhaps she doesn't think you are the right one for her and she is making a convenient excuse. You've been together for almost a year now. Give it as much time as you feel the situation warrants. Time is certainly on your side. At some point you will need to make a decision to move on to someone who will commit to you.
Make that clear to her and go on with your life. I am 11 years older than my husband. I'm female, despite my username. We met when he was 23 and I was 34, married three years later after spending our first year apart while he was deployed. I can tell you that age has nothing well, very little to do with it. It is all about maturity and communication skills.
My husband is mature for his age and the first year of our relationship was spent solely on the phone.
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We did nothing but verbally communicate and it was a great way to get to know each other really well. He was not a typical 23 year old much like yourself and was ready to settle down. I think the key here is for both of you to understand that your moving to Beijing is just another step in your relationship. You say that you'll compromise by settling down earlier than you had planned. I don't think that's a good way to look at it.
The 8-year rule states that you shouldn't date anyone outside of an 8-year age range. people can successfully date with an age gap of more than eight years. I've dated (or tried to date) women who are older, younger and, if you'll simply missing someone's references doesn't make you a bad person. The younger you are, the least likely that the match is for anything other than sexual Eight years is a huge age difference in youth, makes less difference in.
You will want to settle down when you meet the right woman, regardless of how old you are. Long distance relationships are extremely difficult and it's hard to know the day to day person until you live in the same city. My husband returned from his deployment and despite being on the phone constantly while he was away, we were together for six months before getting engaged, and then another six months before getting married. Ask her to please just let you take this leap of faith for the two of you and don't make any future plans beyond that. Not saying to plan on it failing, but take it one step at a time.
I have a friend who married a woman some years older when he was about At the time we age-peers raised eyebrows at the match because 30 seemed "old" oh, how dumb we were , but they have been married for about a decade now, and she gave birth to their second child 6 months ago. Their first daughter is about 8 years old. They seem very happy. I'd wait for marriage until you're 25, though. I wouldn't date anyone younger than 25 because, though adult, they haven't truly grown into themselves yet.
It will make you a better partner. The people I know who jump from living-with-parents to living-with-SO no solo experience with responsibility have the worst time. The older partner with more adult life experience may become frustrated with the younger, who has not had the opportunity to learn those lessons.
Although you may be ready to walk down the aisle, it can be hard to get a younger man to put a ring on it. My 28 year old cousin met and married her husband when he was 22 and they've been together for 15 years now and have three kids. Some people do indeed get hinky about age differences I was in a brief almost-dating situation with someone where that was our age difference, and ultimately he couldn't shake being creeped out that I was old enough to have been his babysitter , but I think it's more the difference in "life" than it is the difference in "calendar years" in your case. I grew up with a single mother. If you want it, go for it.
Also, the only time I think about our age difference is along the lines of "gee, I've been driving for 23 years now and he's only been driving for nine. I don't think an 8 year age difference is a per se a problem. I am 8 years younger than my girlfriend I am also a woman , and it has never caused even a slight problem. We tease each other about it occasionally - but it's really a total non-issue.
I know I wasn't ready to make a life-long commitment at 23, and the vast majority of people are also not ready at that age. You may be different, but that would make you an outlier. She might be afraid that you will move to Beijing and resent her if it doesn't work out, or if things are difficult for you. That can be a pretty hard fear to work through. My younger current partner made a huge compromise in order to be with me, and while we are very happy now, there was a really tense period of insecurity when I was afraid that any piece of misfortune or a particularly bad argument would confirm for him that he made the wrong choice.
This is probably what she's worried about. And as the product of an unstable childhood myself, I can tell you that the fear of disapproval and then abandonment by the people you love is real and runs deep no matter how together you may look or feel. You sound extremely mature and adaptable for your age, but you're right that this is a big move for a relationship. This could be great, but before you think about settling down and having children: Are you okay with that? At 31, she likely has a time frame for when she would like to start a family.
Ask her to communicate this with you, and then for the love of everything let her go with plenty of time to move on if you're not feeling it.