Fear of divorce.
The fear of divorce is so prevalent that it keeps some women from even stepping towards the aisle. Kristen, a then 30-year-old lawyer in New York City, says, “I told my boyfriend [now husband] that I didn’t want him to propose until I said I was ready. It was the 50 percent divorce rate statistics and the premise that probably everybody thinks their marriage is going to work and 50 percent of them are wrong, that scared me.”

Getting “ready” took six visits to a behavioral counselor who helped Kristen approach her fear in a rational perspective. By talking through her thoughts, Kristen learned it was OK to be a life partner and still stay true to herself. “I have a much better life with my husband than I ever did by myself,” she says.

Remember the wedding is just the beginning of the marriage.
Schacht agrees that taking time to think things through, like Kristen did, may be helpful for a lot of women. “Just remember, there’s no rule about when to get married. The second you get engaged everybody else is like, ‘Let’s get the ball rolling here.’ But maybe you’re not ready to roll the ball. You have to move at your pace,” says Schacht.