Who Says Marriage Holds You Back?: A Response to "23 Things To Do Instead of Getting Engaged Before You're 23"

Tonight, I've had several friends share an article on my Facebook news feed: 23 Things to Do Instead of Getting Engaged Before You're 23. And really, it's just the umpteenth in a series of articles and blogs decrying the Kardashian/Teen Mom approach to marriage and relationships. But just to change things up a little bit, I'd like to offer up my story, and my take on things.

Now, I get that the idea of being married before the age of 25 doesn't appeal to everyone. I'm 24. There are things in my life I still want to do. I just graduated from nursing school and matter of weeks ago with a bachelor's degree, and all of a sudden, there are so many new doors open to me. I'm smart, I'm capable, I'm driven - I've also been married since I was 19.

Again, I get it - it's not for everyone. Different strokes for different folks, people are entitled to their own decisions. The difference is, when people look at my decision, it's often with at least one of the following thoughts:

• Where's your baby?
• Poor thing, you'll never be able to live your life to the fullest now that you've tied yourself down!

The condescension that now comes towards marriage in your 20's has escalated to the point that everyone assumes that I've thrown my life away. I'd like to present the possibility that maybe I'm living my life better and more fully as a married 24-year-old than I would have as a single college student.

Vanessa Elizabeth, the author of "23 Things to Do Instead of Getting Engaged Before You're 23", says the following:

I have begun to notice a common thread amongst all these young unions: inexperience.  Inexperience with dating, traveling, risks, higher education, career direction, SEX, solitude, religious exploration, etc… and it’s insane that I have already experienced more of the world in the last 22 years than my married peers will ever experience in their life.

Perhaps I am not one of her peers, but being married hasn't deprived me of any of these things - and doesn't necessarily deprive others who take a similar path as I have.

Since it's written in all-caps, lets first address sex - if you know me personally and are grossed out by the idea of my talking about sex, feel free to skip this section. But why do marriage and experience with sex have to be mutually exclusive?

The first time having sex with anyone is bound to be awkward - no matter how experienced you are, no matter how many partner's you've had, completely synching your sexual habits with someone is not immediate, no matter what television and movies say. You don't know if he's going move his leg, or if she's going to move her knee all of a sudden. You don't know if she makes sounds that you can't keep a straight face through. You don't know if he's going to pull out, or where he's going to try and stick it in the first place. Sex isn't glamorous. It can be awkward and induce more laughter than moaning at times because honestly, you just can't tell what's going to happen. Having more partners doesn't change that.

Furthermore, when you're married, what do you think you do. There is sex. Believe me. For most newlyweds, there is plenty of sex - enough that after you while, you can't even do it as much as you did before; enough that you, funny enough, have to act like an old married couple and actually have other hobbies together. You can hardly call most married couples inexperienced at sex after they've been married for a while. Active with fewer partners? Maybe. Hopefully. But no less experienced.

For that matter, marriage doesn't necessarily mean a person will experience any of the valuable things that Vanessa Elizabeth listed any less than their single counterparts. Let me tell you my story.

I started dating my husband when I was 16, and when we were 18, he joined the Army and was stationed on the other side of the country. I stayed in California to go to college, while he built on his career. That November, he found out that he was going to be deployed to Iraq the following year - and the next July, we were married.

But that wasn't the end of my independence and new experiences. I continued living on the opposite side of the country from him to pursue an education. Marriage didn't make me last my goals, but instead, presented me with new challenges and new hurdles. The first time I ever traveled on an airplane alone was to fly to North Carolina to see him - and to be honest, I never would have dared to do it if not for him. I lived away from my parents, worked for the first time in my life, learned to take a bus and travel independently, all while going to school, and all because I was married and was on a new path in my life. I finished my associate's degree as class speaker, transferred to the university, and started on the path to nursing school. I made friends, hung out, tried new things, attended protests on campus, tried new hobbies, realized I sucked at them, performed in front of people.

Now, let me present to you another idea:

Being single is stressful.

The trouble of going out and being single, meeting and dating and sleeping with a wide variety of people, getting dolled up and being out on the town - none of those things ever really appealed to me. I really wanted to focus on growing as a person, and honestly, being married, I never had friends pressuring me to go out and do things I didn't want to do. I was the married friend. If I didn't want to go out drinking, it was always my ticket out. I could focus on growing and improving on things I wanted, because the social pressures of being a young 20-something weren't there anymore, at least not in the way they would have been if I was single. It allowed me to balance having friends with bettering myself academically and professionally.

Being married allowed me to focus on bettering myself and realizing my interests.

I'm not 25 yet, but I've already been married for about 5 and a half years - since getting married, I've traveled to 4 new states I've never been to, flown across the country alone (including one incident that including missing my flight and having to bounce through airports across the country, all by my lonesome), completed two college degrees, lived in and moved in and out of 4 different places, tried learning to drive, published my first novel, worked two jobs, made some friends, lost some friends, gotten into car accidents, paid hospital bills - I've been living fully. In the years to come, I'm going to work as a nurse, have a family, go on trips, buy a home... the list goes on. So as for the suggestions of things I should have done before getting engaged, thank you - I've done a lot of them since getting married, and if they interested me, I can still do most of the rest.

You don't need to worry about me lacking experiences in my life because marriage isn't the end of new experiences. Done correctly, it's the beginning.