Engaged and having doubts

So basically...I met my fiance on a Christian dating site. We chatted for a few months and i decided to visit her in her country, Kazakhstan, and I live in South Africa (im white south african and Portuguese and she is Russian).

The thing is we both really wanted to marry... so we kinda rushed things. Before we had met in person, we decided to arrange visas for her to come back to SA with me, and that we would get engaged when i arrive there. I would visit her and meet her family etc, and she would return with me and we'd get married. Everything worked out as planned, and now she is here.

The thing is... Im now feeling like Im unsure about marrying so fast. I know i know, it is my fault, and we shouldn't have moved so fast. We need to do a marriage interview on the 9th May and then after that we can marry. Her visa is for 3 months. Shes been here a 10 days. Shes asking about a date when we're going to marry, and her parents are asking because they expect us to. Just i feel we need to wait a bit and get to know eachother better. And she picked up that i was having doubts and not rushing this as before and she got upset. I dont want to hurt her,but at the same time i really feel unsure. And if i tell her this she's gona flip. I also feel bad because her family are good Christians, dads a pastor, and they were very good to me when i was there. I dont want to waste anyones time... just now i feel a bit trapped and bound by a time limit and im starting to stress out here. The thing is she fasted and prayed, i prayed, her parents also fasted and prayed,and everything has worked out. But i do feel we must know eachother better, because i dont like the way we argue when we do... and there are things that bother me. I know every couple has issues etc but these to me are serious, and i also dont feel the connection that I've felt before with someone. Im unsure if it will develop or not. And it scares me cause i dont want to make a wrong decision and end up in divorce.

Please any advice on what to do?

If you have doubts now they want get better once you're locked into a marriage, in fact they will likely get worse. You don't want to waste anyone's time? How much time will be wasted years down the road with a divorce?
I know a woman that felt pressured to get married to someone she didn't know well and didn't want to. It immediately showed in the marriage and the way she behaved toward him. He noticed and became bitter. Long story short that one decision ruined the rest of her life.
You think it's difficult now wait till the divorce then see how difficult it is to deal with her and her family.

Yeah, either break off the engagement now, or take a longer time to get to know each other first.

Whatever happens, keep talking! Talk to her mostly. Talk honestly and get her to talk honestly. Whatever you do, don't shut down and shut her out of your thoughts. TALK to her.

Yeah it might end with you two not getting married. Or you might talk it out. But any possibility that comes from talking to her about these matters will be far better than almost every possibility that comes from just clamming up and going on with the wedding.

Thoughts in no particular order:

It's much more miserable to be in a bad marriage than to be single (for all parties involved)

If you can't be honest with your wife (or wife to be), who can you be honest with?

Who or what is imposing a time limit? What are the practical reasons (if any) that you can't slow things down a bit and get to know each other before marrying?

You've got to be able to have the difficult conversations together to be successfully married. You don't have to like or enjoy them, but you do need to be able to address the tough stuff with each other. If you can't do that, you aren't ready to marry each other.

What are your reasons for wanting to get married? What are the reasons you want to marry this woman in particular?

Marriage is a commitment and vow to make it work out, not a hopeful wish that it will.

What do you argue about when you argue? Are these issues that show you are not on the same page in how you want to live your lives? How do you argue well and productively so that disagreements are productive instead of destructive?


Yes I ask lots of questions. They're to help you think things through, so don't feel like you have to post an answer to all (or any) of them on the forum.

Listen to all the good advice above ^^

Well, you are certainly in a bind. Did you have doubts about this before you became engaged? There is nothing wrong about moving fast if you were confident that this was the woman that you wanted to spend the rest of your life with. Apparently, you felt that you knew each other well enough to decide to get married. This woman has made a commitment to you and sacrificed a lot to leave her own country and come back with you.

Seems to me that the issue is that you have a fear of commitment and now have cold feet. Since her visa is good for 3 months I suggest that you take this time to find out each others hopes and expectations if the marriage were to take place. Right now she is probably having serious doubts too concerning you.

My counsel is to go ahead with the marriage interview and see how that works out. You say that everything has worked out as planned. You can either cancel the plan or execute the last stage of the plan. You were not so unsure before after going through great lengths to bring her back with you. You have cold feet and this is normal. You could be missing out on the opportunity of a lifetime. If you do send her packing at least do the right thing and pay for her transportation back home.

If you don't marry her God will just appoint someone else to take your place so at least she would still have a chance for happiness in marriage so please take comfort in that.

Yes, getting married can be a stressful time, I understand that full well. Pray to God that if this is the right woman for you to become your wife that He would put love in your heart to share with her. I don't believe that at this point God will tell you to break it off with her. This is a decision you will have to make on your own.

Glad to have you as part of our community. Welcome to CC.

Disengage.

Thanks for th3 advice. Well before we met in person, we had already decided to get engaged when we do meet, and when we finally met, I didnt feel as much attraction and love inside as I had expected. I know some people expect too much and butterflies etc, but i know what true strong love and romance feels like, and I never felt it. But since we had come so far and were at a time limit i decided to give us a chance which i did. I didnt want to act too quickly on my initial feelings because we all know they can sometimes deceive us.

But now that we have gone through everything and spent more than 2 months together, I still feel unsure and that deep love and attraction is still not there. I just feel horrible about it... I hate the situation im in. And i feel like God will punish me or be angry because im breaking her heart after we both prayed, and she fasted etc alot. So im very confused as to why God allowed it yet i dont feel what i should for her.

She has a return ticket the 10th July so she can go home safely then.

Both her and i have had our heart broken a few times and we thought we had found the person for each other.... and now once again, both our hearts will be broken. It pains my heart each day to know i must break things off. And even worse when she goes to bed i hear her crying... this happened twice after i tried explaining to her i had doubts and wasn't sure about the marriage. Then to calm her and nake her feel better id give in and say well we can still try and we have time.

I wonder how this ended.

It probably looked something like this...

Is that the girl from Zombieland, eating the icecream?

Probably with her hooking up with another dupe to get a ticket out of Kazakhstan.