Got married -- the sequel!

Hey everyone! This is a sequel to the post on my marriage! So far I've received a couple of questions there that I thought would be better explained in a separate post:

Any chance you can edit your post to tell more details?  I see you met via OLD.  Can you tell us some of the green flags, what made you choose him, what does he do for a living, what is his family like?

So happy for you! Would love to hear your story on how you found your partner and vetted.

How did you know you wanted to marry him?

First of all, I am a 24F raised in a relatively Conservative family in Asia. However, I'm a teeny bit more modernised myself. Please note this information as it influenced my set of red and green flags and eventually my partner. Arranged marriage is still quite rampant in my society (indian immigrant whee) and I was hell bent on actually properly knowing someone before I get married.

In terms of green flags, most of them are mentioned in my OLD guide. However to reiterate them and maybe summarise them overall throughout the relationship:

- stable and strong family unit. Involved father who has supported his wife throughout kidney cancer and hernia and still in love with her to this day.

- parents are very involved in his life and he has a younger brother looking up to him. Both are extremely smart and well rounded (although with different niches.) My husband is into robotics and is doing a PhD while his brother has gotten an interview for medical school. My husband still had a curfew when he met me and it was a green flag for me as I hated the double standards that were given to sons vs daughters for curfews. His mom also made sure that both sons are highly successful and she firmly reiterates to husband on her strong conviction against domestic violence as well as making sure women have careers even after children.

- he gave up a lot to be with me. He's doing a local PhD even though he has the talent and opportunities to go overseas. He wanted to get married since my full time job and his phd, confounded by our curfews made dating extremely difficult.

- I also have anxiety and overthinking from previous avoidant attachment partners (spent a good year healing but yaknow PMS symptoms ugh) and he is still very sweet and reassuring and knows what I need. Does not shun menstruation or other similar womanly matters but takes the time to remember rough period dates, etc.

- also gets me really cute presents for my birthday!! We also have monthsaries for a special meal.

- I think what made me choose him was that he displayed HVM behaviours I specifically appreciate and he is a third culture person just like me! He is also super smart and has a strong family system.

As for how I vetted, I included the OLD specific ones in my previous posts. However, another thing I did was also withholding potentially vulnerable information about myself (medical history, sexual preferences) until much later and he did not force me to give him any of this info before I was ready. I personally did not want to do PIV until I was married and he respected that. I also kept looking out for blood in the water tests but they didn't really come.... he just genuinely wanted to get to know me. He also told his mom about our date before he embarked on the first one. I also heard that he told his mom he wanted to marry me after 4 months. We also work through arguments relatively quickly over time as we found that we often argue when we are hungry and usually the topic gets trivial after lunch (HAHA)

However, I'd say the best vetting tool is.... Time. We've gone through me being sick, getting laid off, getting the worst panic attacks, arguing over trivial things, ethnic differences (south and east indians yay) and yet his commitment still remains as a choice, just like the choice his father made his own wife back then. He also respects my parents and is good friends with my brother too. Finally, I think its just an overall gut feeling. Within the first few dates there's a sure "knowing" that this person is the end-game of sorts and the feeling is unmistakable.

Married life is definitely not a bed of roses (2 families merging is not always the smoothest) but we are making it work together as a unit and it's what I appreciate most right now.