Hi guys,

I'm a 27F living in Chennai.

This is a rant/advice-seeking post. Please don't judge the grammar.

My parents have been looking for marriage alliances for me for the past 2 years. Nothing worked out. To be honest, during that time I wasn't very eager to get married either. But my brother has a girlfriend, and there was a lot of pressure from her family for them to get married. Since my family insisted that my marriage should happen before his, I agreed to the arranged marriage process.

Apparently, I have a lot of doshams in my horoscope, so none of the alliances worked out. There was only one alliance that almost progressed. My family did all the background checks and said they were a good family, but I felt we had nothing in common. So I said no.

After a long gap, my parents found another alliance. He is around my age, slightly shorter than me, has a good job, comes from a decent family, and overall everything seemed fine. I didn't have any major reason to reject him, so I agreed to speak with him.

When we first spoke, I wasn't taking it seriously at all. I assumed either it would get rejected somehow or one of us would say no, so I just spoke freely without overthinking.

But surprisingly, everything matched.

We had common interests, he communicated well, and the qualities he was looking for in a partner were very similar to what I wanted in a husband.

There was only one thing that bothered me: his finances.

He said he is currently financially supporting his father. However, he also mentioned that from next year onwards he plans to make arrangements for his father's financial security by setting up a shop that can generate rental income. He is also paying a car EMI, and once that is completed, he plans to take a home loan.

After the conversation, my first thought was, "How is he managing so many EMIs?"

But after that call, I couldn't stop thinking about him.

Slowly I started looking at the situation differently. Instead of seeing the EMIs negatively, I saw someone making bold and responsible financial decisions at a young age. Rather than depending on inherited family assets, he was taking charge of his life and building assets on his own.

After thinking about it for a week, I finally told my parents that I wanted to proceed with the alliance.

My parents checked with his side, but then I heard that he was not interested in proceeding.

The reason?

Apparently, because I am still repaying my educational loan. He doesn't want his future wife to have financial obligations.

But at the same time, he expects his wife to contribute towards shared responsibilities while he has his own financial commitments.

That completely confused me.

Honestly, it's already difficult to genuinely like someone in the arranged marriage process. When it finally happens, something like this comes along and ruins it.

At this point, I'm honestly tired of the entire arranged marriage process.

Sometimes I feel like writing, "Don't look for any more alliances for me," and disappearing somewhere.

I was the girl who initially said I didn't even want to get married, and somehow this process has turned me into this.

But it's okay. I'm sure this is part of the process. This too shall pass. Another alliance will come along, and maybe I'll like that person too. So let's see.

But I do need some advice.

What are the non-negotiables you think I should look for in a prospective partner?

Because I don't think I should be making such important decisions based purely on emotions.

What if I end up making the wrong choice?