Therapist warns about 'red flags' that may indicate your partner only proposed to get you to 'shut up'
- Australian influencer Monica Millington said she believed she got a 'shut up ring'
- Wedding therapist Landis Bejar, from Atlanta, Georgia, weighed in on the topic
- She said rushing to the altar to please a partner is more common than you'd think
A therapist has shared the 'red flags' that may indicate your partner only proposed to you to get you to 'shut up.'
Back in July, an Australian influencer named Monica Millington went viral after she recounted how her first marriage ended in divorce.
The social media star, 33, explained that she tied the knot with a 'decent man' when she was 23, despite knowing deep down that they 'were just not a good match.'
They ultimately divorced after three years of marriage, and looking back, she now believes that her ex-husband only asked her to marry him because she continuously pressured him to walk down the aisle.
Monica said she was convinced that becoming husband and wife would solve their problems, and that her reluctant boyfriend ended up giving her a 'shut up ring' after she 'literally begged' him to marry her.
Wedding therapist Landis Bejar has shared the 'red flags' that may indicate your partner only proposed to you to get you to 'shut up'
Now, wedding therapist Landis Bejar, from Atlanta, Georgia, has spoken to Business Insider about the topic, and she admitted that rushing to the altar to please a partner even if you don't want to was more common than some may think.
'[A shut-up ring is] used to pacify or relieve some pressure that's going on in a relationship,' Landis dished of the phenomenon.
She explained that many woman tend to want to marry their partner despite there being 'red flags' in the relationship, because they believe putting a ring on it will prove the man is 'committed to them' and 'prioritizing them.'
But in reality, she said that marriage won't fix your problems, but would only make them worse in the end.
'It's an early indicator that the couple can't talk about hard things and can't work through hard things,' she explained.
'Instead, one person decides to appease the other person instead of voicing how they really feel about it.'
Landis, who specializes in 'helping brides and grooms navigate the stresses of wedding planning through therapy,' said the key to preventing this from happening was communication.
'You gotta have conversations where you allow the other person to be honest about how they feel,' she continued.
Back in July, an Australian influencer named Monica Millington went viral after she revealed that she was given a 'shut up ring' during her first marriage
She said many woman tended to want to marry their partner despite there being 'red flags' in the relationship (stock image)
'This doesn't have to be an aggressive conversation. It can be warm and loving and filled with hope. But you gotta talk about it.'
As for 'red flags' to look for, she said partners who weren't really ready to get married would often make promises but failed to follow through with them.
In addition, if you're 'constantly giving the same feedback and asking for the same thing in different presentations' from your partner, it's not a good sign.
While sometimes it was hard, she stressed the importance of accepting when someone just wasn't right for you and let them go.
'[People] are not prepared to say, "I'm not going to try to change you anymore,"' she added.
'Without that, then you'll tolerate whatever, or you'll keep complaining, and either you'll be upset all the time, or you might get something like a shut-up ring that just alleviates the complaining in the short term but doesn't lead to what you actually want, which is [a happy] marriage.'
