Thank you all for the responses. We are locked into a lease where we both pay a set amount and to be completely honest I don’t think I have any friends that would welcome me to live with them for an extended period of time (lol this is true, unless my apartment burned down or something). But I can see why an idea like that would work.

So I slept on it and have a couple of thoughts:

1) Maybe “marriage” starts before the proposal? I’m trying to shift my mindset a little. Like what is the foundation I want to build with my boyfriend for a future together? One where we argue every week and I pressure him into something he’s not ready for? A lot of men want to have kids eventually, but just because they’re married and say they’re not ready for one “yet,” doesn’t mean they’ll never be ready. So I do believe he does want to marry me, it’s just a financial/timing thing right now.

How would I want to look back on this time in my life with him? We did move in together a few mo the ago, so that in itself is worth celebrating.

2) I have to go to a friend’s bridal shower next weekend (I’m a bridesmaid) and also next weekend is my newly engaged friend’s birthday party so there will be a lot of congratulatory engagement talk happening.

I’m going to have to exercise a little mental and emotional toughness that day. I’m obviously happy for my friends, but I feel the “lack” of an engagement and marriage in my life right now.

How do I want to look back on their celebrations though? I want to have fun and celebrate the happy moments in their life.

I know this will sound weird, but I almost want to be in the experiences like an outsider looking in and detach myself a little. Like I can experience it all, but not on a personal level. Sort of like I’m watching it happen on TV and thinking “Wow that’s wonderful!” I think it’s a self-coping mechanism and maybe it would be healthy for me to detach myself a little. In dialectical behavioral therapy they say to “observe your thoughts” and just acknowledge, oh yeah there’s that thought again, okay thought you can go now… and let it go. This might be a good wedding season strategy for me?