15 Things Every Couple MUST Discuss Before Getting Married

So you and your partner are thinking about getting married. Maybe you're even engaged already. Either way, congratulations! Finding the person you want to share your life with is a big deal, and it's an amazing blessing. But one thing we don't talk about enough is how difficult it can be to truly share your life with someone, especially if you're used to living pretty independently.

Getting married doesn't mean totally giving up your independence, but it does means giving up some of your independence. The major decisions you're used to making on your will involve another person, so you're going to have to make those decisions together.

This can be a difficult transition for a lot of people, and it can cause a lot of tension early on in the marriage. One way to make this transition easier for you and your partner is to have some intentional discussions before your wedding date, or even before you decide to get engaged. This will give you the opportunity to understand where you both stand on certain issues and why. Having these conversations will bring you closer together and help you avoid surprises when these things come up in your marriage, because they will.

You don't have to discuss all these questions at once. That would be super overwhelming. Tackle a few questions at a time and have authentic, detailed conversations about each of them. If you can't be honest about this stuff now, then it's definitely a sign you're not ready to tie the knot.

So, before you walk down that aisle, make sure you've had serious, honest conversations about these questions. You'll be happy you did.

15 Are we going to have kids?

People have seriously strong feelings about having kids. Some people have known that they want kids their entire lives. Others are ambivalent. Still others really don't like kids and are sure they don't want to have them. You can imagine that it would be pretty bad for a marriage if you and your partner are on different ends of the spectrum. I know it was a deal breaker for me. I've known that I wanted to be a mom since I was five, and that certainty about having kids has never wavered. I knew that anyone I was going to marry was going to have to want kids.

This can be a scary topic to address since the outcome of this conversation can change the direction of the relationship, but it's an essential conversation. Imagine being married for a few years, wanting to have kids, and then finding out your partner doesn't want them. Heartbreak territory, right? So, don't wait until you're married to find out where you both stand.

14 How are we going to handle our money?

Money is at the heart of every marriage, whether we want to talk about it or not. One big mistake newly married couples make is not figuring out their finances before they get married. Honestly discussing you finances with your partner can be scary, but facing your fears and having the tough conversation is better than finding out that you fundamentally disagree about money management after you tie your financial future to theirs.

Another important part of this conversation is making a plan about how you manage your money and shared bills. Will you have a joint bank account? Will you maintain separate bank accounts and manage your bills separately? Will you have savings accounts? Retirement accounts? Do you trust each other to spend responsibly so the bills aren't neglected? The bottom line is, if you go in to your marriage with doubts about money, it'll haunt your marriage forever. Get it all ironed out in advance so you can comfortably move forward.

13 What are your expectations for nookie?

Sex is one of the number one reasons that couples get divorced. I'm not here to tell you that you should be having sex at least 'X' amount of times per week or per month to keep your marriage happy. The right amount for your marriage may be completely different than the right amount for another couple. The important thing to decide is how much sex is right for each of you, taking each other's sex drives in to account.

If couples have wildly different expectations of how much sex is 'enough' there will definitely be problems in the marriage. If one person isn't getting the amount of sex they want they're likely to feel neglected and resentful. If one person feels pressured to have more sex than they want they're likely to feel like their boundaries aren't being respected. This is definitely not a healthy place for a relationship to be. Let your partner know what you want, and really listen to what they want. Establish expectations that meet both of your needs, and understand that these expectations will change as your marriage evolves.

12 How do our families fit in to our lives?

When you marry someone, their family becomes your family. That can be amazing, but it can also be very challenging, especially if you interact with your family very differently than your partner interacts with theirs. My family is incredibly close. Everyone is up in everyone's business and we see each other at every available opportunity. My husband's family enjoys their space. It was really interesting to see how differently we interacted with our families and to understand how this had shaped our ideas about what our family would be like in the future.

How often do you each expect to see each other's families? When you visit will it always be both of you or will you frequently visit separately? How will you decide which family you visit on each holiday, or will you host both families at your house? If your families live close will they have keys to your house? Answering these questions will set expectations for each of you and your families ahead of time, so there's no drama.

11 How do our individual hobbies fit in to our relationship?

Getting married doesn't mean you have to give up the things you love to do alone or you're your friends. Having individual hobbies is key to maintaining a healthy marriage. At the same time, it's important to set boundaries around individual hobbies in order to protect your time together, especially if your partner has a hobby that takes up a lot of their time or they're obsessive about.

I used to be deep in to martial arts. I trained 6-7 days a week, sometimes for multiple hours a day. My husband, then boyfriend, was very accommodating, never complaining about how much time I spent training. Every once in a while, he'd voice that he wished I would come home instead of going to the gym, and I (almost) always agreed, acknowledging that our time together was just as important as martial arts.

This balance of individual activity and shared time became the bedrock of our relationship. Talk to your partner about the things you love to do and how you'll balance maintaining these hobbies and spending time together.

10 Do you enjoy the same activities?

Just as important, if not more so, than individual hobbies are the things that you and your partner like to do together. If there aren't a lot of things you like to do together then it's going to be hard to continue to have fun together throughout years of marriage. Make a list of the things you love to do together. These can be active things like sports, hiking, running, or biking, but they don't have to be. If you and your partner love to play board games together that's great! Even if all you like to do together is binge TV shows, that still counts.

Talk about how you'll make space in your busy schedule to do these things together. Set achievable goals for how much time you'll spend doing these things together.

Also, discuss things that you'd like to try with your partner and ask them what they'd like to do with you. Be open to trying new things with your partner and be compassionate if they express zero interest in something new you want to do. Finding things you love together will keep you together.

9 How do we communicate with each other?

If you don't know how to talk to your partner about everything, the scary stuff, the uncomfortable stuff, the hard stuff, the silly stuff, then your relationship is doomed. I'm not being dramatic, I'm just being honest.

Everyone has a different communication style. Some people will talk something to death until they feel like its resolved. Other people need to take time to think about the topic before they can have an intentional conversation. In conflict, some people like to yell, others get quiet, and others get defensive. Misunderstanding your partner's communication style, especially during a conflict, can create massive problems.

Tell your partner how you like to communicate and what you expect from them communication-wise. Then listen to them tell you the same. Most importantly, be willing to adjust your communication style to mesh better with your partner's, and make it clear that they should do the same. There's a middle ground here, and you should both occupy that middle ground.

8 What are your deal breakers?

Everyone has deal breakers, and it's essential to lay them out up front. Deal breakers are different for every person, but they represent the limits of the relationship. What are the things that would create a rift so deep that your relationship would not recover? For me not wanting kids was a deal breaker and my now husband knew that long before we got married. For many couples cheating is a deal breaker, but for some it's not; they're willing to work through infidelity to keep the marriage together.

Lay out all your deal breakers up front and ask your partner to respond to each one. What are their thoughts? Are these deal breakers for them as well? Are either of you willing to change your mind about certain deal breakers? If so, what compromises can you make to make these situations not deal breakers? Make these expectations very clear, without any gray area so your partner can't say they didn't know and neither can you.

7 What do our career paths look like?

Unlike our parents' generation, we don't stay at one job from post-grad to retirement anymore. The average Millennial has had at least four jobs before they even get in to their thirties. Millennials are much more likely than their parents to have multiple careers throughout their life, not just multiple jobs within a single career, and Millennials are more likely to make major career changes.

These types of changes are easy to make when you're single. But when you're married this kind of change is a much bigger deal. It directly impacts your partner and your shared finances, especially if your career change means a significant salary cut.

Talk to your partner about your current career and how long you see yourself staying at your current job and within your current career. Share your career dreams, even if they seem like pipe dreams. Being a writer was my pipe dream and my husband always supported that dream, even though it meant taking a significant financial hit. Now I'm weeks away from being a full time freelance writer because I was brave enough to say out loud that I wanted to pursue that career.

6 Are either of us planning to pursue further education?

Pursing higher education is an admirable thing, especially if you're going to school for the first time later in life, or going back to school after a long break. More people than ever are pursuing non-traditional paths to degrees. All told, my Bachelor's took ten years of on and off college attendance. My husband never went to college, but recently decided to enroll for the first time so he could pursue a career change.

Though pursuing a degree is a great choice, it is a big choice for a relationship. It likely means that you both will be taking on new debt in the form of student loans. It also means that there will be another activity in one of your lives that will take away from your shared time.

Before you get married, discuss what your plans for higher education, how you can prepare for the additional financial burden, and how you'll balance school work and your relationship time.

5 Where are we going to live?

If you don't currently live together, then figuring out where you'll live once you're married is a major step. Will you keep one of your current places and cohabitate there or will you get a brand new place to call your own? If you plan to move in to one of your current places, then have a talk about how you will make that space belong to you both, not just the partner currently living there. This may seem silly, but it's a big deal. When I moved in to my husband's condo I spent a long time feeling like I was a guest in his space. We made some very intentional changes to the space to make it feel like it was my home too.

If you currently live together discuss your plans for future housing. Will you stay where you are permanently or would you like to move to a different place? Do you plan to buy a house someday? If so, what details about the house and location are important to each of you? Answering these questions now will help solidify your future housing goals.

4 If one of us gets an awesome opportunity are we willing to relocate?

Say one of you gets an offer for their dream job, but that dream job is across the country. Would you both be willing to relocate to accommodate that new job? This question will be more or less complicated depending on attached each of you is to your current location. If one of you loves where you live and have strong ties to the community it will be harder to consider leaving. Talk honestly about whether you'd be willing to make that sacrifice for your partner. Ask if they'd be willing to make that sacrifice for you.

Be sure to include proximity to family in this conversation. If one of you is very close to their family it will be hard to make a move far from them. Talk about how far you'd be willing to relocate from your family. My husband and I both agreed that we'd be willing to make a major move, but not one that puts us out of driving distance from our families. This allowed us to set boundaries around the scenario of a major move.

3 What the deal with the exes?

I'm not saying you should interrogate your partner about their relationships with all of their exes. For the most part, relationships they had prior to you are really none of your business. But exes become your business if they are still a part of your partner's life.

Talk to your partner about their friendships with their exes. Let your partner know what fears you have around these relationships and what boundaries would make you comfortable. If their friendships with their exes makes you super nervous that's definitely something to unpack before you get married. Find out if it's something you need to get past or if there's actually cause for concern.

If your partner is a loyal and trustworthy person there shouldn't be any problem with them maintaining friendships with their exes. You have to learn to trust their love and commitment to you.

2 What lengths are we willing to go to in order to work through our problems?

Something I wish we talked about more is how much hard work goes in to a marriage. Love is not enough to keep a marriage together. You need to be willing to work with your partner to solve recurring relationship problems, and you need to be willing to work on yourself in order to bring a better person to the marriage. Divorces happen when one or both partners decides that the marriage is no longer worth the work.

In our patriarchal society the onus of emotional labor often falls on the woman, and she ends up doing most of the work to keep the relationship together. This is not acceptable and this needs to be made clear before the marriage begins.

Talk to your partner about the work they're willing to do in order to keep the marriage together. Are they willing to examine their part in recurring conflicts and make changes? Are they willing to go to marriage counseling if things get really bad? Set up expectations for emotional labor that work for both of you.

1 What role does religion and/or spirituality play in our lives?

Millennials are an increasingly agnostic and atheistic generation. For many, religion is not even on the radar. For some, spirituality rather than religion is important. For some, religion still plays a crucial role in their daily lives. With all these different faith based experiences it's important to discuss what role religion or spirituality will play in your marriage.

If one of you is religious, do you expect the other person to adopt that religion? Does your partner need to convert in order to marry you? If you are against organized religion will it bother you if your partner is religious? If you plan on having kids, will you raise them with a particular religion or with no religion at all?

For people who are deeply spiritual or religious, these beliefs are the center and driving force of their lives. Having a partner who is not understanding or supportive of these beliefs can be very stressful. Find out how you will interact with each other's religion and spirituality before it becomes a problem and make no assumptions.

Getting married can be the best thing that ever happens to your life. Staying married can be one of the hardest things you'll ever do. If you take the time to discuss these topics in depth before you get married, you'll gain a better understanding of your partner and you'll have a blueprint for how you'll interact with each other for decades to come.