A childhood friend of mine, now in her late twenties, recently sent me a WhatsApp message. In two months she was getting married, and she was inviting me to the wedding. I gave a usual reply, but I added a thoughtful question. “Wooow, congratulations! I’m so happy for you. Are you ready to start a family?”
“I don’t know if I’m ready.”
“I feel you! So generally, how do you feel about it?”
“It’s funny, but I really feel overwhelmed.”
I did not find it funny. I found it familiar. But what I typed back was too short and too generic: “Marriage takes work. It needs constant self-improvement, but when you’re both committed, it works and it can be so beautiful.”
Her reply was four words. “It’s really not easy.”
Those four words stayed with me. They were honest, and they made me wonder...
Everyone asks, "When?" Few ask, "How?"
In many Rwandan families, a young person in their mid-twenties meets the same question at every gathering: “So, when are you getting married?” Although it often comes from love, eventually it may get really annoying!
But notice what the question contains: a date, never a method. Nobody asks, “How will you two handle money?” or “What will you do when you disagree?” Marriage is treated as something you just grow into after the ceremony.”
So when a young person hesitates, the family often hears fear or stubbornness. Sometimes it is neither. Sometimes it is someone who understands the stakes and wants to be sure.
But is the hesitation justified?
Rwandans are marrying later. The average age at first marriage is now around 28 for men and 25 for women, and registered marriages fell by about 5% between 2024 and 2025. Experts quoted there, point to young people having their own income and education and to having watched difficult marriages up close. As one put it, "Today, people have more freedom to decide whether, when and how they want to build their lives."
The caution also has a solid basis. Divorces are on the rise, and of the divorces registered in 2025, about 4 in 10 ended marriages less than ten years old, according to national statistics.
Does that mean marriage mostly fails? Maybe! But it can also be argued that the early years decide a lot, and unfortunately, those are the years we prepare the least for.
We prepare for the day, not the years.
Think of what a Rwandan wedding involves: the traditional wedding (gusaba and gukwa), the civil ceremony, the church blessing, and the reception. All with their own elegant outfits, logistics, and many sumptuous formalities that require months of preparations and a big budget. There are committees, contributions, and meetings. We have a whole system for that ‘special’ day. Marriage, on the other hand, is not a ‘special day’, it’s not an event. It resides in the mundane, in the ordinary, and therefore it often doesn’t get as much attention and dedicated preparations.
So what system do we build for that new life that is marriage? What system is there for who earns and who decides? How close do you stay to each family? How do you handle conflict, children, faith, and a lost job? Many couples have these conversations for the first time after the wedding, tired and in the middle of an argument. In 2012, a New Times columnist asked what comes “next, next” after the big day. To many, that question is only asked after the big day.
But even preparation is not a cure. A 2010 review of 47 premarital education studies found that programmes helped couples communicate, but evidence of lasting satisfaction was weak. Perhaps the real preparation is simpler: a habit of telling each other the truth, of having difficult but important conversations early and regularly. But between the hectic wedding preparations and the romantic sweet talks, who has time for that, right?
What does a good marriage even look like?
We rarely define it. Is it one that lasts forty years, even if it is quiet and cold? One without conflict? One where two people keep growing and keep choosing each other?
Many of us learned from the marriages around us. Today’s couples often work, live far from relatives, and expect friendship as well as romance, adventure as well as stability, career growth as well as well-raised children, with extended families less involved than before. That is more to ask of two people and less support to ask it with.
Questions we need to reflect on as a society
This is not a verdict. It is an invitation, for parents, for young people, and for anyone who has felt overwhelmed with the idea of marriage or who has answered “I’m overwhelmed” with a short and generic advice, to reflect.
Do we put more effort into preparing for the wedding day than for the marriage that follows?
Should marriage remain the flagship project of a person’s growth, or is it just one path to fulfillment among many other options?
Is “till death do us part” still a realistic expectation, or an honest hope that needs honest preparation?
When we urge our children to marry, what are we giving them besides a date?
And perhaps most importantly, what does it really take to have a successful marriage in this day and age?