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It’s not completely out of the ordinary for a woman to not want to be married. That’s not the end goal for every one of us (y’all heard what Amanda Seales said), and there are plenty individuals who are part of successful long-term relationships who haven’t considered it. However, I don’t believe that Chrissy Lampkin is one who doesn’t consider marriage to be for her.
During Monday night’s episode of Love and Hip Hop New York, Chrissy shared over the first dinner Jim Jones had prepared for her in their 16 years together, that she no longer felt it necessary for them to marry, despite the huge engagement ring worn on her finger for years.
“From inception, people have always had something to say about our relationship. It’s partly my fault because I proposed to you,” she said to him. “After that proposal, we didn’t get married because we weren’t ready and you’ve asked for marriage after that and I wasn’t ready. We’re still together. We have a crazy bond, nobody can tear it apart. We’ve been together, what? A million years? And if marriage never happens, I don’t feel a way about it anymore because marriage doesn’t complete us.”
However, Jim actually felt differently.
“But I do want to get married,” he said. “I believe every woman who’s in love or is in a strong relationship that we are deserves to have that.”
“I don’t feel that way, and I know that sounds crazy,” she replied. “In the beginning, I thought that was the end-all, be-all. I thought that was natural progression. But at this point, what is that going to change for us?”
If you’ll recall, Chrissy was the first to pop the question, doing so during Season 1. He would follow up by proposing to her the next season. Nevertheless, movement towards the altar didn’t happen, despite how sincere she seemed about them marrying one another. Now, she sounded more over it than at peace about whatever may occur, especially in her confessional when she said, “leave me alone with this whole marriage thing.”
“I just want you to to know, I’m with you. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” she told him. “I know people that get married and then divorced in a year. They get it annulled in six months. We’re fine the way we are.”
“Us, I think we deserve it at some point,” he responded.
In her confessional, Chrissy was a little more forthcoming about the real reason behind her new feelings, and she sounded a tad fearful.
“I just think a marriage will put extra pressure, and I just don’t want to put those types of demands on our relationship anymore so right now we’re not on the same page about marriage, and that’s okay,” she said. “Sh-t, we ain’t been on the same page about that ever.”
This has been a common thread when it comes to the reasons the couple has settled on making certain big decisions. Chrissy recently told VH1 that the reason they never had children was because she didn’t feel that she would be able to get what she would need from him to keep their relationship afloat upon the arrival of a kid. She too said that wasn’t “necessary” for her.
“I love children and I take care of everybody else’s, but it’s just not necessary for me,” she said. “I’m a person that feels like a child doesn’t complete me, especially with my lifestyle. I’m an only child, my parents are gone, grandparents are gone, Jimmy’s always on the road, I just feel like a child would cause me to put more pressure on the way he moves and I don’t think our relationship could stand that. I’m not trying to be a single parent. Even though he’s a good father to his son, there are some things I would want different and I know that I wouldn’t get that from him, at least I think I wouldn’t. And at this point that ship has sailed, girl, these eggs is fried [laughs].”
I think Chrissy chooses to settle on certain ideas in order to protect herself. If she waits long enough and pokes enough holes in the idea of things that she may desire, then she won’t be hurt if and when they don’t happen. She’s gotten used to doing that in order to maintain her relationship with Jim, because that’s easier than pushing him to mature and do more to make things work for the better. So it’s interesting to now see that so much time has passed that they’ve both been worn down to being okay with what the other party once wanted, with Jim now saying they “deserve” to be married and Chrissy saying no. Maybe if instead of talking about it in the future tense, if Jim actually moved his feet and showed initiative to plan something, or even suggest elopement, she might feel more like the old Chrissy. But either way, I don’t feel like this is time making her feel more secure in her relationship, with or without the ring, because she just moved to Miami a few years ago to make him step up more. Instead, I think she wants to be in that relationship with him so much so that she is worried if he is expected to have to stand by some vows or do more, it will cause dissension that the relationship can’t take, so she just doesn’t want to talk about it anymore. That sounds more like settling than compromising to me, because it’s as though they’re staying together but choosing not to progress because she’s afraid he would fail her. That’s a little sad.
Whatever they choose to do, it’s clear Chrissy isn’t going anywhere. And while she certainly doesn’t need to marry to quiet the public, she really needs to figure out if she’s waving the white flag on it not because she’s fearful of how it would look or feel “if it doesn’t happen,” or because it’s truly something she doesn’t want.
Hit the flip to see reactions to Chrissy and Jim’s confusing convo and share your thoughts.
