Joy-Anna Duggar and Austin Forsyth caught breaking a courting rule

Joy-Anna Duggar and Austin Forsyth have been the center of Rumors since they announced their courtship. In December of 2016, falsehoods spread that the pair had broken one of the most sacred of Duggar courtship rules: no sex before marriage. There was even a story spread that Joy-Anna Duggar was pregnant even before they walked down the aisle. While most Duggar women are pregnant almost immediately after their wedding night, getting pregnant before would break one of the biggest rules of the Duggar household.

Courtship rules

Those unfamiliar with the Duggar family may not be clued into the intricacies of their dating rules. Duggar kids don't just date, they do "courtships," which is dating with an intent to marry. During this time, the couple gets to know one another better and decides if they are suited for a relationship that may one day lead to marriage. They are not allowed to be alone with one another for fear that their desires may give way to temptation, so they always have a chaperone present, even if it is one of the younger Duggar children. The couples do not hold hands until they are engaged and refrain from anything but side hugging when they are together.

Kissing, just like sex, is reserved for marriage for the kids of the Duggar household. They are expected to wait until they are at the altar to share their first kiss, which is typically done in front of their entire congregation.

Which rules did Joy-Anna Duggar and Austin Forsyth break?

Joy-Anna Duggar and her husband, Austin Forsyth, have confessed to breaking at least one of the cardinal rules of the courtship, and that full-front hugging. The pair admitted that they engaged in this forbidden activity before marriage on a recent episode of "Counting On."

"We’re humans and sometimes we don’t always abide perfectly by our rules. We try. That was a real hard try," Austin Forsyth admitted.

Joy-Anna Duggar's parents have stated previously that each couple gets to set their own courtship rules, but from an outsider's perspective, it doesn't always seem as such since all of the rules of the courting couples are almost always the same.

Very few of the Duggar children have strayed from the traditional courtship rules, making many wonder if there are hidden forces at play or if they are pressured into maintaining the same rules as their siblings, even though there is the idea that the couples can decide for themselves what they would like to do.