I've been with my boyfriend for 3 and a half years, things are going well between us, but sometimes I wonder if I should really marry him or if I should look around. I don't know if it's normal to have these doubts or if it means something. How did you know it was the right person?
After 3½ years, it's normal to have doubts - but the trap is mixing up "I'm not sure" with "I'm not happy". If you're wondering about this because you imagine someone else would make you happier, that's usually just the grass being greener on the other side. But if you notice that with him you feel suffocated, misunderstood, or that you're really not moving forward together on the important stuff, that's different.
The test isn't about finding 100% certainty - that doesn't exist for anyone. It's about knowing whether you're actively choosing him every day or whether you're just staying by default.
The real question isn't finding absolute certainty, because that doesn't exist. What you need to do is look at how you feel day-to-day with him and whether you're moving in the same direction. Do you work through conflicts together? Can you be yourself without forcing it? When you imagine yourself 5-10 years from now, do you see him beside you, or is it fuzzy? Those little things tell you way more than occasional doubts.
Doubts are totally normal, honestly - they're not automatically a bad sign. A lot of people have them before a serious commitment because let's be real, it's a huge decision. But there's a difference between "I have normal fears about marriage" and "I'm not sure I'm with the right person". If 99% of the time you feel good, you get along, you make each other laugh... that 1% of doubt might just be your brain liking to overthink things. But if most of the time you have the feeling something's missing or it weighs on you, then you need to listen to that.
And honestly, nobody can tell you "he's the right one", not even you right now. What matters is the decision you make with him, not finding some magical certainty. If you really want to move forward, talk about it together. Not to ask him "am I the right one?" but to talk about what you actually want, your respective fears, how you see things going. Often when you get it all out there you can see things more clearly.
Absolute zero doubts don't exist for anyone. But what really matters is knowing how to tell the difference between normal little worries and genuine deep discomfort. If you're asking yourself "do I want to build my life with him?", that's different from "does someone better exist out there somewhere?". One is healthy self-reflection, the other is just grass that looks greener elsewhere.
After 3 and a half years, there are bound to be moments when things stabilize and you start thinking about the long term for real. That's when the real questions show up. I know someone pretty close to me who was in the same spot - she was mentally stagnating, constantly wondering if she should've tried something different. In the end she figured out it wasn't really about her guy, it was about herself and her need to feel like life wasn't frozen in place. Once she sorted that out in her head, the doubts dropped off a lot.
Do the simple test: imagine life with him in 10 years, the annoying stuff included (the little habits that get on your nerves, the compromises you'll have to make). If you can live with that calmly and you find it acceptable or even nice, that's a good sign. If it makes your stomach tight, then something's missing. And if you spend your time imagining a parallel life with someone cooler who only exists in your head... well, that's a different conversation altogether.
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