Duggar Daughter Courting - Jill Duggar Explains the Side Hug
Jill Duggar is engaged to Derick Dillard and the relationship is playing out on TV for all the world to see. The Duggar fiancé took time to explain the famous "side hug" that she and her sisters have decided is acceptable for intimacy before marriage.
"We had actually talked about it first, before we met," Jill said in the latest episode of "19 Kids & Counting."
Duggar and now fiancé Dillard met when dad Jim Bob decided to accompany her on a trip to Nepal so the two could finally meet in person after months of texting and communicating via Internet. Jim Bob thought that Dillard would be a good match with his daughter and so introduced them from around the world. When Dillard and Duggar met, they exchanged a quick side hug, which was approved of by Jim Bob and Dillard's family as well.
"A side hug is a good medium between super closeness and too distant," Duggar explained.
"You don't want to be too strict but you don't want them to be too liberal either, just letting them do whatever," Jim Bob added. "I encouraged them to set their own standards as they're getting to know each other."
The Duggars are famous for their family values and make sure to put God first in their relationships. Dillard and Jim Bob were prayer partners for quite some time before Jim Bob decided to intervene and set him up with his daughter. It was a serious idea and the two immediately hit it off and got engaged not long after.
Duggar and Dillard will exchange vows in June, and it remains to be seen whether or not they will allow the TV cameras to film the ceremony. Oldest brother Joshua wed his wife Anna on TLC and they now have three children. Part of the vows they exchanged stated that they would accept any children that God gives them – Jill and Derick are likely to exchange the same vows.