People Thought I Was Crazy For Moving In With Him So Fast, But It’s The Reason We’re Still Together

It’s no secret that relationships require work, sacrifice, and time — but if you make it through the tough times, you’ll be able to look back and pinpoint some of the decisions that helped to keep you together. For my husband and I, deciding to live together when we’d only known each other a short time was one of the best things we ever did for our relationship, and I’m glad we decided to dive in — here’s why:

1. We were forced to spend more time together. Spending significantly more time with another person will either make you like them way more or a whole lot less. Lucky for my husband and I, who had only been dating for a month or two at the time, we ended up falling even more in love when we moved in together. Spending more time together brought us closer than ever before. I’m not sure we ever would’ve lasted long enough to get married if we’d not moved in together when we did.
2. We ended up finding more things we had in common. Moving his stuff into my house, we found all of the hobbies, books, movies, video games, and other things we had in common with one another. Going through someone else’s things to integrate them into your own is a great way to get to know someone.
3. We were no longer losing sleep to see each other. Since we had completely different work and sleep schedules (I was working a 9-to-5 from Monday to Friday while he was on late-night retail hours), one of us was always losing sleep to be able to spend a little more time together. Moving in together ensured we got to spend all of those extra little minutes of the day together. It meant both of us started getting our seven to eight hours of sleep a night, which meant we were both less moody, more awake, and less stressed out.
4. It saved us a boatload of money. Nothing strains a relationship like money problems. Moving in together meant we had more money in the long-term for spending on our wedding and fun things. Living together made good financial sense at the time, and it still does. Saving all that money saved us a lot of stress — stress that could have eventually broken us up.
5. We went out on fewer dates. Turns out, neither my husband nor I like going out on dress-up kind of dates. We’d both rather sit at home and watch TV together then bother with the whole idea of dating. After we started living together, we both decided on fewer dates and more staying at home in our PJs. Who isn’t happier in their PJs?
6. I got annoyed at his habits, which forced me to communicate with him. Moving in with my husband was the first time I’d ever lived with an S.O., which was a massively different experience than living with a roommate. We share a bed, vehicles, a bathroom, and live practically on top of one another. It took a lot of getting used to and ended up causing a lot of fights. It forced me to learn how to argue productively early in our relationship, making both of us better at communicating what made us happy and what made us really unhappy.
7. We grew way more comfortable with each other really fast. I’ve never been in a relationship long enough to actually get to the ‘no makeup, messy hair and don’t care, fart in front of each other’ part of the relationship. It was something I’d never experienced with anyone before. Since I didn’t want to start sleeping in makeup, I was forced to adopt it pretty early on in our relationship. It was different, fun, and weird — but getting into that comfortable place with my hubby early on made the difference for us.
8. I got to spend more time with my friends. Instead of spending every spare minute with him and spending less time with my friends, I ended up getting more time to spend with people in my life other than my S.O. I didn’t have to save every spare minute for him; he would always be there when I got home. Turns out, keeping my other relationships happy and healthy made my relationship with my hubby stronger too.
9. We had more free time in the bedroom. I enjoy taking my time when having sex. I like chatting, trying out new things, and spending at least an hour cuddling, having sex, and just being together. While we weren’t living together, we had to rush a lot of our time in the bedroom together. But once we moved in, we had more time to take our time and I discovered how much more awesome sex could be.