Exchanging rings with my fiancé was one of the happiest moments of my life.

I showed off my new bauble to family and friends, which often brought up their own engagement stories. Before long, marital advice started pouring in and not all of it put me at ease. The unsolicited commentary made me realize that I needed to evaluate if I was ready for such a big step.

Be prepared

Due to personnel changes in her company, my best friend got transferred to a satellite office across the country for a year-long assignment – two months after she got married. Though she and her husband made it work, my friend was quick to tell me how lonely she’d been and hinted that the same thing could happen to me. Wondering if my soon-to-be marriage could survive a similar strain, my fiancé and I looked at our work schedules over the next several months. Though it’s impossible to be prepared for everything, we were able to talk about upcoming events we knew about.  At least now we knew when we’d be apart for training or conferences. As a precaution, I started paying attention to the cost of plane tickets and we each set aside a little extra money each paycheck to specifically cover the cost of travel. In the event of a transfer, we wouldn’t have to panic that we couldn’t see each other due to lack of funds. [Read more…]