#20

Wow, you are lucky! At 15, my perfect mate was my dog.
I think pets are a better substitute for children than they are for partners/mates. You can still scold them and send them to their rooms - don’t try that with your wife.

I personally prefer a cat, because they know how to bury their shit and they’re more independent (like me). But unlike a wife (or husband), you can always throw them outside if they’re getting annoying.

And I don’t think having a pet ages you faster…unless it’s like @DrFraser 's dog. He was asking for advice here on how to get rid of him!!!

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#21

Some dogs can drive :joy: ( saw it on YouTube)! And you don’t need to be married to go to your doctor’s appmnts - you can take Uber.

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#22

In theory, some cars can drive. I’m looking forward eagerly to the time when most cars do.

Uber (or busses, which is what I use) doesn’t work if the doctor requires a responsible adult to be the transport. My brother just had some proceedure to look at his heart artery & had to sort a friend at short notice to be the driver.

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#23

I am married 52yrs my wife and I are fit. It most people 73 are in sad shape

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#24

Unfortunately when you’re having a heart attack, dogs are pretty bad at dialing 911. That’s probably why married people live longer. You have someone watching your back.

Unless your spouse is 40 years younger and patiently awaiting their windfall. “Let’s go skydiving, dear!” “Have you tried pufferfish?”
:wink:

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#25

I’m starting to think I need to merge this thread with the Humor thread: Just a little humor - #113 by AnUser

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#26

I’m 66, and have been married for 25 years. I got very lucky, and we have a very good marriage.

My health has certainly benefitted - there were several occasions where my wife persuaded me to get medical attention, when I was in the typical male mode of “it’s probably nothing, it will pass, I’ll walk it off etc.” In retrospect, I can’t imagine what I was thinking sometimes, like walking around with an abcessed tooth, thinking it’s just some minor passing gum/tooth sensitivity, until my wife insisted I get it checked out.

Another time, I had some bleeding “pimple” on my back, that I was ignoring until my wife insisted I go to a dermatologist - transpired it was a basal cell carcinoma, which was removed (15 years ago, and no recurrence, touch wood). Or my wife will spot that I’m dehydrated, because as she says, I don’t recognize my own body signals.

While we were dating, I loved my motorcycle, but she was against it. I insisted that I’m an excellent rider… except, the van driver was a terrible driver and I landed in the hospital and recovery for six months. I was eager to “get back on the horse”, but she would have none of it - and since then I can’t believe how stupid I was… because you can control your bike, but can’t control every driver on the road.

I can’t cook for the life of me, and my diet was terrible, eating out at all times. My wife is excellent with food prep, but more importantly, on the same page when it comes to consuming a great diet - we both got on CR and it’s been 25 years of top notch home cooking (restaurants are a rare outing).

I could go on. But honestly? We are just compatible and agree on the big things (even if we sometimes don’t on minor stuff), and are both easy going and low stress.

However, the biggest thing, and I know everyone will see this differently, but it’s been a blessing that we both agreed naturally - NO KIDS!!! Before the shouting starts - I’m not against kids, I don’t hate kids, in fact I like kids (in small doses, lol!). And I’m not saying kids are bad for you, and yes I know for most people their kids are the greatest blessing in life ever! I’m just saying for us no kids is better - kids are too much stress and worry (as my wife says, she’d be a basket case from sheer worry about bringing up a kid in today’s world). That right there, is a massive “keep us young” benefit… it may be that others are just more competent when it comes to raising kids, but we are not (then again, we see friends with kids, and if I’m honest I don’t see them have any “keep you young” benefit).

Bottom line, in this n1 case, marriage has been a huge boon to me in every way. YMMV.

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#27

You do bring up a good point. Without marriage there are no children. They can be a great social foundation. I just spent a week in Las Vegas travelling to Bryce, Zion, and the Grand Canyon with my dad and son. He couldn’t have done it without me (too much driving). But the road trip was fun watching the scenery, talking, and listening to classic pop music in the car. It was a great social experience that we’ll all remember for a lifetime.

I never feel lonely because of my sons and parents, and my parents don’t feel lonely because of their kids. That’s another benefit.

Also, he wouldn’t have ever tried Rapamycin without me. I guess marriage and kids can add years to your life.

Children are not for everyone, and they are expensive. Just like everything, there are pros and cons.

Of course not every kid is looking out for their parents best interests. And no, I did not have my dad try the pufferfish.

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#28

Beautiful Steve! I couldn’t agree more. We have only been married 23 years but it’s been wonderful to see how when we shifted to love being a verb rather than just a noun it transformed us both as individuals and our marriage.

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#29

It depends on how much you bond with your dog. A Japanese study shows when a dog owner and his dog look at each other, both of their brains secret oxytocin, a hormone produced in the formation of intimate love between the parent and his baby. You change your babies diapers, right?

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#30

Dogs are the grace of God. They are the only species who voluntarily walk into human society 40,000 years ago, and co-evolution with human beings, till 10,000 years ago we greatly selectively breeding them into more than 300 different dogs.

Dogs are social animals, just like human, and their ancestor, grey wolf, hunting as a pack, has a strong bonding to one another. Dog shifts the bonding to his human and see his human as parent. No, a dog admires his owner as leader and loves his owner as parent, but not your partner…

Yes, dogs are more like never grow up baby, never get a job and never leave home. However, the whole idea to have a dog is for companion. What we value is the loyalty of the dog, which we may not always get from our partner, right?

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#31

You can only hope about that.

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#32

Especially with the risk of incontinence that comes with aging. Thank god for “Depends”, not sure you could get your dog to wear those.

Yes, as I said,

But I think now, with the rapid advancement in AI chatbots, the best alternative (to wife/girlfriend) companion might be incorporating a speaker/microphone and AI chatbot into a collar that can be worn by your cat or dog so that you can converse with them. See the movie “A Boy and his Dog” 1975. This may be a likely development.

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#33

Isnt there something with this article about unmarried women also living longer than married women? I seem to remember something about this. Although…its seems women do OK with longevity generally.

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#34
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#35

Men are lucky! What about women? It’s a pity they aren’t included in the study :wink:

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#36

I was a fairly happy single guy that worried about all his friends getting married. Foolishly I thought “well, if they’re all doing it, there must be something in it.” So, at 45 I married a beautiful woman and started a “married life”. Well. The first thing she did was she started to eat like a starving dog. Packed on the kilos and now the “model” that I married is looking more like the Goodyear Blimp.
I’ve stuck with her because she’s also very kind and devoted. But I am repulsed by the extra weight.
The other thing is…her mother. Her mother, with whom we spend about half of each year, is the most manipulative, bullying, controlling, bombastic, self-opinionated, sad, miserable, friendless, disgusting, bad mannered old bag that I have ever met. And she’s a raving hypochondriac.
So, all in all, yeah I was much, much happier as a bachelor. I wouldn’t be surprised if I’ve aged twice as fast.

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#37

:joy::joy::joy::joy:Cannot stop laughing! Thank you. It was great!

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#38

Long time ago while going to tech school, I worked part-time in a factory and all the line workers were women. One of them asked me if I was available, told her no. But she brought her daughter to work part time. The daughter was pretty hot and had a good sense of humour.

The male supervisor and I were the only 2 men that worked the late shift so we talked quite a bit. He laid this piece of wisdom on me… “you don’t just marry the daughter, you marry the mother too” some of the best advice I’ve ever heard on this topic. I’ve seen this type of thing destroy more than a few marriages.

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#39

Thank you for your kind words. I’m glad I at least made you laugh. But not a word of it is untrue.
Oh I forgot to say that there were no children. We tried, but found out too late that my wife had a medical issue that prevented children. Probably just as well in some ways but now that I’m older there are moments of regret.
Instead we had cats. When one died in 2008 I think a piece of me died too. The last one died last year, aged 20. I miss her heaps.

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