I have a friend at work who always calls her ex-boyfriend her "ex-husband", yet they were never married. They lived together for a couple of years (no more than 2-3) and have a son (which was not planned), HOWEVER he is actually still legally married to another woman (who is the mother of his other 2 kids).

Maybe because I'm married, but for her to call this guy her ex-husband seems funny to me because I don't see it that way - though they are trying to reconcile and will probably get back together.

I was just wondering if a serious boyfriend/girlfriend is the same as a spouse...

I am not sure if they have it here in the US or not but in Canada if you have been living with someone for so many years you can call the person your common law spouse...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common-law_marriage

Common law marriage is defined differently from state to state, Marilyn.

In my opinion, unmarried folks refer to their partner as a 'husband' or 'wife' to lend some respectability to a situation they are personally uncomfortable with.

No, I don't think you can call someone your husband/wife unless you are married. I mean, that's the definition, no? Can I start introducing myself as "Dr. Jenn" because I like how that sounds?

Hahaha, I like that.

My sister lived with her now husband for 10 years before getting married and he was always her boyfriend, and then later her fiance. I believe there is a difference.
When you marry things do change - and I mean for the better too.
My husband has always been my best friend, now he is my family member too.

I know that we don't all agree on this subject because a close friend of mine disagrees with this. I was wondering how VJ sees this.

A lot of this is culture based. Here in the States, I would say no, but in other countries it can be quite different. My fiancée refers to me as her husband out of a display of commitment and that fact that we "created a family" by co-habitating. It began the day we started to live together when I stayed in Russia for a year. And, of course, I call her my wife. We both are aware we are not legally married. But we use the titles as serious terms of endearment. Most Russian women, I know, refer to a fiancée, as "husband" if they live together.

If it's common law marriage, then it's marriage. Also many people can't legally get married, and I feel like if they want to say "he's my husband" about someone they're not able to marry legally, that's perfectly fine.

I personally don't care what other people say. Feeling a family tie to someone is in your heart anyway. Legal marriage just means they can get details on your condition in the hospital, etc.

eta: As to what KT said, I agree. In Brazil, we lived together, and the guy at the padaria was always asking after my "husband" if I went there alone. I told him we weren't married, but it didn't matter to him (or anyone else) -- Rey was always my husband and I was his wife.

I'd tend to say no, except when the common law marriage applies. BUT, my best friend has been living with her "boyfriend" for 6 years now, I don't think the boyfriend title does their situation justice, so I find myself saying things like "her boyfriend/ husband, they have been living together for 6 years...". Tie the knot already, and make it easier on me!

Saludos,
Caro

I often call my sister's fiance my BIL. They have been together 5.5 years, have a house and cars together, they have a good relationship. He is more than just her boyfriend to me and the rest of my family, but there is no word for it. Fiance seems to imply they will be married soon, but that is not panning out to be the case. They got engaged in Dec 05 and there still is no date and we all wonder if there will ever be one. So what to call him? Boyfriend sounds too transient. He is definitely not. I have no idea what he is. Might as well be my family. He thinks the same.

oh yeah this reminds me, my brother-in-law and his girlfriend have been together for about 6 years and they have a son together... I think most of us think of them as husband and wife already ....

Obviously, legally the answer is quite clear. Either you are or you are not, depending on the laws in place in your jurisdiction.

That said, if someone wants to, in a non-legal capacity, use the term spouse in a manner not consistent with the law, what business is it of mine? Or of yours?

ETA: I voted other.

Great explanation. If I were living with my SO for many years without marrying them, I'd probably call her my wife if my intention was to be in a permanent relationship but didn't want to get married.

i voted no
if you don't have to go thru the courts to get an official divorce, it's not your spouse.

My vote is no. And as a precautionary comment, if the couple involves an alien that is seeking a K1, for goodness sake, if you are in this habit of referring to your betrothed, "get out of it" before you try to enter the country.

It certainly would depend on the circumstances and who it is being said to. The only time I could see myself referring to my SO as my spouse is if we had been living together for several years and we planned to stay together permanently. However, that kind of arrangement has never made sense to me, particularly if there are children involved.

No, I meant in the immigration context. There is a member here whose fiance was removed expeditiously when he arrived at the POE because he referred to his betrothed as his wife (customary practice, apparently, in their relationship) and he was cited as having used the K1 inappropriately.

Mermaid is right - I've heard this before. My (now) husband referred to me as his wife before we got married because we are in a serious relationship and in Brazil MANY people "marry" without going to the courts.
I also believe that this term is often cultural - that's why I find it strange that my co-worker uses it - it's not as common in the U.S.

I know what you all mean when you say that "boyfriend" is not a good enough term in some relationships. Like my sister and her "boyfriend" of ten years. I was glad when they finally got engaged, then I could call him fiance (hehe). I did refer him as my BIL after year 9 since they lived together and owned everything under the sun together - plus they were engaged....

No, he is not your husband if you're not married to him, and I would not call myself his wife if I was not married to him either!

In the UK, the term 'partner' is used quite a bit. I suppose it's the alternative to 'husband/wife' and describes the situation accurately. When you get past age 18, 'bf/gf' seems silly (well to me it does)...esp when you're living together, yadda yadda yadda...

I referred to D as my 'partner' when I got back home, and everyone thought I was a lesbian

Then why not get married? It's not really permanent unless you do get married, otherwise you always have an escape clause.

my fiancée and i exchanged rings. we consider ourselves married even though there is no paper showing it. we will get the paper when she arrives in the US. a piece of paper is all that it. it is how we fell toward each other that tells us we are husband and wife

Well take DM's advice up in the middle of this thread, and tell your fiancee to remove her ring and stop calling you 'husband' at the interview, or else it may lead to delays....

Unfortunately the law doesn't see it that way. But if you plan on getting married, and can't yet because of immigration issues, then I suppose that is a different situation.

I do hate when people insist that "it's only a piece of paper". When if it is only a piece of paper, then what is the big deal?

I remember telling a group of femala co-workers before I got married that the only thing that was going to change was my last name. Oh did they laugh... . Now I understand why - and I mean that things change for the better too.

I think people see things differently once they marry - not in all cases, but generally (IMHO).

In my SO's tribe when you have agreed between the families and paid for the woman you can call yourself husband/wife. Which was a little strange because while I was there we were going through his photo album and there was a woman's picture. He says this was my wife XXXX . I look at him and say have you been married ? NO After several minutes of total confusion he informs me that he had paid for here and even put het through college but she had died in a car acccident before they could have the wedding. I gave him a BIG lecture about using the wife word at any of the immigration stuff . Not for me not about her.

I was speaking hypothetically. The few people I've known who lived together but never married had some negative views about the institution of marriage. While I don't share that same sentiment towards marriage, I understand where they are coming from. I personally would like to see our government stop using the word 'marriage' and instead recognize civil unions, leaving marriage to being a religious ceremony. That way all couples living together could get legal recognition without necessarily being married.








Interesting.

That's what I always wonder. It sounds like, in spite of the protest otherwise, that they are actually reserving an "out" if things go south. If the paper doesn't really mean anything other than a mere formality, why the resistance to it?


I'm actually leaning heavily in this direction myself. For one thing, it gets the government out of the business of putting a moral stamp of approval on relationships, which isn't the business of government anyway.

most of the answers are pretty much black or white, all or none. The papers are merely technicalities. I think being a spouse is more than papers. As far as the government is concerned, I'm not yet married. But according to my heart I am already.

They government doesn't care morally, they care legally. You see it all the time where people who live together separate and they take up court time and want a judge to treat them as if they were married and go line item by line item on who gets what. Let's say you had different "levels" of marriage or co-habitation and you had to differentiate, well if you are only co-habiting you don't get spousal privilege and you don't next of kin.

If you don't have a legal document, one could argue "well, we never really lived together, I don't owe her anything" and so on and so.

When I referred to 'my parter' with 'he/him/D/etc'...this one new colleague of mine at the time looked at me with such a confused look on her face, then came the 'oh so you're NOT a lesbian?????'

funneh

lol..i am sure she was sizing you up...just joking

I personally say no. Not husband or wife till you are married.

However, it is pretty common in Jamaica to hear someone refer to their BF or GF as their husband or wife.

Actually, I agree with you on that point; as I was saying above, I do think the paper matters...for one thing, it is a public demonstration of a commitment to a permanent relationship. What I was agreeing on with Fancypants in my quote above was the distinction between marriage and civil unions. Declaring a relationship to be a "marriage" or not is a moral question, and thus the purview of the Church or other religious institutions, not the government. The legal issues, which are the government's business, can be handled just fine under the category of civil unions, thus leaving the government out of putting its stamp of approval on moral issues that are not its business.

I dont think you should call them your spouse either if your not married to them!

Yes, very well put... and if those laws include common law marriage, then yeah, those people...who according to some of you, are keeping an "escape route", are also husband and wife. It's so easy to dismiss something when it's different from your own experience. Personally, marriage and the piece of paper is something that appealed to me, but sheesh, I'm not going to say that if someone chooses not to get married that their relationship is less valid.

I don't think it's about being judgmental about others' relationships. For me, marriage is really just a formality, and I wouldn't feel that mine or anyone else's relationship is any less valid if they are not married. Isn't referring to someone as your spouse assuming that people will not respect your relationship otherwise?

YES! Maybe they run into it enough to know that some people look down on unmarried couples and they don't want to deal with it.

I think there is a cultural component to this, not by state but by your cultural heritage. My mother calls my fiance my husband. He has been calling me his wife for a year and a half and I have had to remind him that if he says that at the interview we'll be denied. His sister who lives in Europe told him that he should call me his fiancee and his response was that he has pledged to God that I am his wife and he will care for me all his days, therefore I am his wife. Many people see the committment of marraige as one before God, not before the courts, and thus define their marraige by their pledge to God. I see my fiance as my husband, but when I'm speaking to people at work or acquaintances, I refer to him as my fiance. Because it's the politically/socially correct term in this country. If I'm speaking with close friends or family, I refer to him as my husband.

I think a lot of it is culture dependent.

My fiance and I refered to each other as husband/wife before we got engaged. In both our cultures in Ghana there is no word for "fiance/fiancee". When 2 people make a commitment to each other the words used to describe the relationship loosely translate to "my man/my woman". A lot of people in Ghana do not go the legal wedding route, especially in the areas.

That said, my fiance and I have stopped using husband/wife because we want no problems with immigration

Interesting. My wife says that true also in her native language (Bisaya), so your either boyfriend/girlfriend or husband/wife.

I understand the cultural component to all of this, however, one must understand the culture within which they live and the confusion it might cause if 'labels' are used out of their typical context.

In the US, the term husband/wife infers that a legal marriage has occurred. To mislead someone to believe you are legally married when you're not, is one's perogative, I suppose. It's one thing to do so verbally, quite another to fill in the significant other's personal information in the section that says "spouse" on any form, especially one that might be legally/financially binding.

sure....unless you are in a state where common law marriage is legal.

In some African countries, people can sometimes begin to call any man they see you continually with your husband out of respect, particularly in modest societies. I think it's very culturally based. Even with my own mother, a man is either your friend or he is your husband. So, he is your friend until he is your husband.

On another note, my husband's very close friends that he has grown up with are also my husbands and they call me their wife. Their wives are my wives. My very close friend who is like a brother to me (in Cameroon) is married and his wife is "my wife." She is called as such and when they have problems he is quick to say he has a problem with "my wife." Ultimately it means that the responsibility of taking care of each other is a shared one. It pays hommage to the communal lifestyle and it is through language that culture is transmitted.

I didn't know that....
Interesting.

'Boyfriend/girlfriend' is for teenagers... if you are an adult living in an adult relationship you have a PARTNER, a 'significant other', or a 'spouse'. And you can have a de-facto marriage if you live with someone for enough years as husband and wife even without going through the formal ceremony - at least in Australia you can!

And interestingly enough, in places that accept common law marriage, you have to go through a legal process to get out of the arrangement....so it's not just about being able to skip out whenever one's had enough...there's no common-law divorce.

you're allowed to say anywhere he/she is my spouse but not in court.