Everyone is making such great points. I just have one very important thing to add…
Pay attention to the ‘red flags’ that come up, discuss them with someone you trust (or at least someone with some experience), and if there seems to be a problem don’t just sweep it under the carpet.
Case in point:
I recently got a call from a twenty year old BT who had recently started dating. She was trying to decide if she should get engaged to this guy she was dating. This was the first guy she had ever dated! He had said and done some troubling things which she listed for me (I will not repeat them here for 2 reasons: I would hope some of them would not get through the Mods and if they did they might help her & her friends identify me). In my opinion, they were signs of current (or possibly a leaning towards future) deviant behaviors. I was very clear with her about my suspicions and the reasoning behind them. She heard me out and then said “but he’s such a nice guy”. This was the only positive thing she could find to say about him, and even then she could not be at all specific about what she meant or how she knew that. I told her she was, in my opinion (and that of my husband who had heard only some of the things she mentioned)making a big mistake if she married him . She said she would think about what I had said.
I was told that as soon as she got off the phone she turned to a mutual friend who was in her house and said “but she doesn’t know me so well”. She continued to date him and was still planning to get engaged.
(B”H I found out that she did eventually dump him, I think even before an engagement although I was told that it had nothing to do with our conversation)
This is not the first time I have seen something like this. In my experience it happens more often with girls. I think that they become attracted to a guy, or to the thought of a guy liking them, and are willing to turn a blind eye to all of their real concerns. So they get engaged and, hopefully, break the engagement, or even get married and then these things come back to haunt them.
Please, ladies (and gentlemen) if something seems like it might be a problem, get advice and act on that advice. You could save yourself a lot of heartache.