Will we ever get engaged?
My boyfriend & I have been dating for almost a year & a half. Starting at 6 months, I'd ask if this was serious for him. He's always said "I love you, I know I want to marry you & start a family with you, when the timing is right I'll propose, you never have to worry about where this is going. If I weren't serious about you I wouldn't be with you." He asked me to move in with him, goes home for the holidays with me & my family. But now I'm getting annoyed about waiting too long for a ring. I'll ask, "Do you intend to propose within the next year or much longer than that? Because I don't want to sit around waiting for 5 years, it makes me feel like you don't value me enough to do something as simple as get a ring." He'll say "I've given you my commitment, I will propose when the time is right, I'm just not ready quite yet". Says he has to fly home and announce to his family (abroad) that he plans to propose before he does so... because he hasn't seen them in 10 years and it'd be "disrespectful" to get married without first having the chance to tell them in person. He is planning a trip this summer to see them.
He says if I have to get engaged right now, then we might be better going our separate ways since he's not ready yet and I'm constantly pushing for it. I said "If you tell me you want to wait multiple more years to propose, then that'll solve the problem right now, since I won't be on board with that & I'll leave you." But he won't say that.
I just want a general idea, if he sees himself getting married/starting to settle down in 2, 5, or 10 years. Because we are almost 30 & I don't want to wait another decade to have kids. He said that is fair & he'll take a lot of time to think about it & then he'll give me a concrete answer & we can see how our timetables line up & whether I want to continue.
his family lives in extreme poverty far away & he hasn't seen them in 10 years but talks to them & sends them every bit of extra money he can, they are always asking him for money. So maybe he doesn't want to get married till he feels he can better provide for both me & them? Maybe that's why he needs time to think in order to come up with a "specific time frame"?