Age Difference

[AGBF]

I am 7 years older than DH. When we started dating he was just shy of 21 and I had just turned 28.
...
when DH told his mom about me he said "I have a new girlfriend, but there's a bit of an age difference, so I don't want you to freak out". When he told her I was 28 she let out a sigh of relief and said "Thank God! I thought you were going to tell me she was 15!"

I have been happily reading this thread and had no intention of contributing my own statistics to it since they are so boring. (My husband is 7 months older than I am.)

When I read this story, however, I remembered how upset my husband's parents were that he was going to marry me...supposedly because I was so old! The reality was that my not being Jewish or my not speaking Italian may have been more important to why they were so upset. Not to mention having me sprung suddenly on them. But what my future father-in-law said to my (then) fiancé as we got on the train back to Paris from Genoa (in Italian, which I then did not understand) was, "Couldn't you have found anyone younger?"

I was 25 and my husband was 26!

Deb/AGBF

 

[TooPatient]

My husband and I are 1.5 years apart. I think its perfect, it was just enough of a gap for him to be more mature that the guys my age.

My viewpoint on significant age gaps (and I am not trying to offend), is it creeps me out. My parents had me young. So while I love having young parents because we are so close, it pretty much ruined the chance for me to ever date an older guy. While many 25 year old's may not have an issue with dating someone 40, I would always be like "ewww, your only a few years younger than my dad!" That usually halted the pursuing on their end! Haha When I was 20, I had a colleague tell me he was in love with me and he was 38. He didnt see a problem with it, but at the time, my dad was only 42. Dating a guy only 4 years older than me was totally disgusting to me. Maybe the rule of thumb should be, if the gap is big enough that one of the parties could theoretically be your biological parent, maybe its too much of a gap?? HAHA.

I will say though, as someone who has always been way too mature for their age, I can see how dating someone older would be appealing. At 20, I was more like 30. So it probably would have been a lot easier to date someone 30!

(I dont understand how a 20+ age works though. To have someone talk about a time when you werent even born yet has to be weird. "Oh I graduated medical school this year" "Oh, I wasnt even born yet". Weird. Its got to be hard to find things is common? Kind of like these guys: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbi...-aspiring-country-music-singer-Las-Vegas.html What do you think they talk about?? lol)

My dad is 63 so my SO is not even close to his age lol. His father is 75. First time I met his dad he said "Well Mr. AN, sexy little tiger you got there!"


I could totally seeing it being completely weird for you though, I wouldn't be able to date someone that much older than me if they were close to my parents age either. All of the guys I've dated are just too immature and STILL are (Both of my ex's are now 25) as immature as they were or even worse now.

Me and FI do talk about times when I was in 1st or 2nd grade and we think its funny...nothing weird about it to us. He'll say something and I'll say "oh sweet! I was like what, 5?" and he'll say "oh my gosh, thats right! holy crap" and we laugh because we forget about the age gap a lot.

I also notice though that I get along very well with older people in general. A lot of my close friends are older (in their 30's) and I value their friendships more than I do of some of my younger friends.

The friends that I do have that ARE my age are very successful already, very mature individuals. One a pharmacist, another lawyer, etc. They're driven, motivated, determined and very mature for their ages as well.

This isn't to say that I don't act my age sometimes because there are definitely a lot of areas in my life where I do. Sometimes I do things that are "very my age" and it catches my older friends off guard, I do have to remind them that yes, I'm still 23

So, I wonder...is your circle of friends around your age too, if you and your SO are close in age? What about those of you who have an age gap...do you also have an age gap with your own friends? I wonder if there is a correlation at all.

All of my friends are older. Mostly in their 40s-50s.

No problem with FI being close in age to my parents... he's 7 years older than them.


(I'm 26, FI is 55)

I thought I had everyone beat here for a minute!

Was it strange at first and then gradually over time become normal?

I don't think it was ever really strange for either of us. We started as friends and just sort of drifted together. When we first met, I was actually pretty sure he was around 35 or so and was a bit shocked when he mentioned his age on his b-day!

Sometimes he'll say something about the weather or a movie from back in the 60s or 70s but then we end up laughing because I wasn't even born yet.

It really is pretty comfortable for us. I do like to tease him sometimes that I don't have to worry about a "mid-life crisis" where he gets a convertible and young blonde because he's already got his young blonde

 

[manderz]

I'm 27 and he is 31.

It's perfect. For us.

Us too