It's finally hit home just how messed up Mormons and Marriage can be. I've been out of high school for four years, and half of my female classmates got engaged just their first year into college. Married soon after, had kids. Some nevermo friends I had there at HS got pregnant right off the bat ( one even during hs. ). But all in all, the people I more or less had an association with either started a family right off the bat or started the process. It was mind boggling and made no sense to me, even before I left the church.

One particular girl got married about two years ago. She's bright, smart, and very talented. I had even met her guy before their wedding, and even then I remember feeling something odd about their relationship. Things obviously didn't work out, because last time I checked up on her she's now single.

It's unhealthy to rush like this. But the church nails it into your head that you MUST get married as SOON as Mormonly possible. I remember how my YW teachers would have us recite "I will marry in the Temple; I will be morally clean for my husband; I will marry a return missionary".

They were obsessed about making sure the YW would be ready to serve their husbands. Again, even as a Mormon at the time, it freaked me out how we were supposed to be entirely submissive to men. Coming from a background of much abuse from men, I had a real problem with this.

It's just so messed up. I have two best friends who are Mormon, and it makes me sad to see how desperate they are for marriage and scouting out returned missionaries and the boys in their wards.

"As soon as mormonly possible"

That's fast! It might even be faster than "Ludicrous Speed" (from Space Balls).

I can totally relate. I graduated HS in 2010, and all but ONE of the mormon girls I went to YW's with are married. Half of them are either pregnant as well, or already have kids. It blows my mind. I can't even picture myself in a long term relationship right now, let alone engaged or married. I still have no idea who I am, and I feel bad that they probably won't get the chance to really find themselves. I have spent the past couple years traveling the world and doing crazy things that have completely shaped the woman I am becoming and I can't imagine how crappy my life would be if I stayed in the church and ended up getting married before getting to do any of that. The desperation really is sad...my old TBM roommate was 25 and not married or in a relationship and she used to cry about it all the time...she was psycho and a total biotch because she was always so grumpy that she wasn't close to being married yet...that drove me crazy!! If I ever do get married, it won't be until I'm like 30! 25 is so young!! And my other roommate was only 21 and is already on her 2nd temple marriage. 21. Seriously. Ugh I can't stand the mormon woman mentality.

I live in the land of fast marriages and faster births. I baffles me as to why people want to start down that path so soon.

I guess times have changed. Almost all of the "kids" I went to school with, that I knew personally in the 50's married "young" - under 21 and most are still married, some widowed. Some divorced, of course. One couple married in high school and are still married.

People are able to make their own choices about marriage. Some don't want to married and be a wife and mother, others do.
It's not my place to decide what is right or wrong for them. They learn from their experiences/choices/decisions.

I'm a proponent of getting married a little later in life now, but it was not that common in our area when I was growing up. Going to college was not that common either, but I did manage a few classes before getting married.

My mother married three times, had four children, I am the oldest. I never new my bio father. Similarly, the youngest didn't grow up without her father either, even though we found him later in life, ill and later deceased.

We joined the LDS Church (most of our little family) as a way to have some solidarity in our lives besides having the maternal grandparents living next door with influences of Christianity and Spiritualism in our lives. There was a need for direction and mother never lost her "testimony" or her love of the gospel.
They are all deceased, except for my siblings that are not religious in any manner whatsoever.

Fifty years has made a huge difference in how we lives our lives and the kinds of choices we have available to us is amazing to me.