If you are so am I- my husband and I lived together over a year before we married. I wouldn’t have done it any other way. No way was I going to marry someone before I knew what day to day life was like with him.
But we did wait approx 2 weeks after we got married to get pregnant.
Being here at FreeRepublic means you are both most likely self-described conservatives.
No wonder we seldom agree here on FreeRepublic.
If anyone with any combination of opinions feels confident to declare themselves a conservative then there will be nothing we can ever agree on.
The same thing happened in the various Christian churches, the Jewish synagogues, and American society in general.
We are no longer a group of people with shared values. We are a bunch of individuals who happen to be occupying the same spot of land and joined only by the propositions that we will most always stop at red lights, and will mostly pay our taxes ... except for the bit we can get away with by claiming more charitable deductions than we ought.
You don't need to live together to learn what day to day life is like.
Anyone in a serious relationship should keep their own residence. Its 10 times harder if you end up breaking up and don't have a place of your own.
I do think it is different if the couple is already engaged or virtually so, vs. just shacking up with no future plans or anything.