Poll about marriage: Men, your wife must work / Women, you have to work--any guilt/regret for that?

In My Humble Opinion
121

Because working from home gives one the luxury of starting small, not having to worry about doing stuff for its profitability. Writing a novel, unless you are already established, is pretty risky.
My wife was able to start by selling a few articles filling in for someone else to selling more to now having a couple of (non-fiction) books and a pretty steady income stream. It far more enjoyable and rewarding than having to go into an office to do writing (she started before doing it at home was well established.)

And don’t knock volunteering. The town we lived in in NJ was near a bunch of research centers, and there was a pool of well educated stay at home women whose work benefited the lives of all. The schools had a lot more input from the community than the schools where I live now do.

122

I find it interesting that no one in this thread has thought it bad that a woman goes to work when necessary, or even when she wants to. However there has been sentiment that a woman not going back to work is somehow letting down society or womanhood or something.

123

You must have had some great pickup lines there, guy.* I went to college in the '70s also, and the balance of trade, as it were, never entered my mind.

  • Actual line used by a friend of mine in a Boston dating bar, 1972: “I’m an economist, and this looks like a marketplace to me.”
124

Because Big Things were expected of me. It was pretty clear that a science or engineering degree, or a professional course of study, was expected (and my parents paid for my undergrad, which was at a very affordable state school). Then in grad school I got grants and fellowships and TA-ships, and left without any debt. I absolutely would NOT have gone to grad school if I’d had to pay for it.

Several times I tried to tell my mom that the whole career thing didn’t do it for me. Boy did that get me in trouble. And tell me–how self-aware is a person at 17? At 20? I certainly didn’t know much about life. I had to go by what people told me.

My husband says his #1 wish is for me to be happy. His mother was a SAHM and his sister is currently doing the same thing (her kids are 4 and 6, and she has an MBA. I’m interested in seeing what she does in the next couple of years). He was raised in a conservative household in a conservative community, and still works in that community. He thinks it’s awesome if I want to work. He also thinks it’s awesome if I want to stay home with the kids. I think he’s secretly glad that I don’t see childbearing as a lifetime ticket to staying at home, though… we have fun chats about what I could do when they’re older.

125

Huh, that’s very interesting. I especially agree with the “how self aware is a person at 17? At 20?” I was fortunate to be mature, but many smart and academically successful friends floundered in college or after, just due to maturity. A lot is expected at a young age, and only now is there research coming out that brains are still developing (especially the delaying gratification and maturity centers) into the mid to late 20’s.

That also helps that you don’t have loans and an understanding husband. I see resentment arise when women (arguably most) have loans and choose not to work because they “fall” for their baby. But yours sounds like a joint decision, and certainly one where you’re not (like your hubby said) bound to stay at home for life. That’s - IMO of course - is an important distinction.

Another cousin of mine is choosing to stay at home while her youngest just entered full-day kindergarten. She receives multiple offers every month to work part time or full time as a pharmacist, flexible hours, etc. Her husband is encouraging her to get out and work - they otherwise can’t set aside enough for college for them - but she just doesn’t want to. Excuse after excuse comes up. I’m not exactly sure why she went to pharmacy school or feels okay making unilateral decisions, with the burden being on her truly kind and gentle hubby. It just seems unfair.

126

This is much my own feeling as well: my parents both worked 60 hour weeks from when I was in abut the 3rd grade on, and what I remember more than anything else was how overpoweringly stressful everything was. And now, the women I know who have small children in daycare seemed to never enjoy their children. It’s always an emergency: baby is sick, caretaker is on vacation, they can’t stay for a meeting, etc., etc. They are juggling all the time. I am not saying it’s terrible for the kids–obviously, happy, healthy kids come out of daycares–but I think it sucks a lot of the joy out of parenting. I’d rather live a working-class life style (while still saving money) and have my husband stay home than live a middle class lifestyle where we are dealing with a never ending stream of emergencies. I want there to be some flexibility in my life.

127

That is just like my wife’s experience. She was in a Biology PhD program, totally paid for by her assistantship, and when I proposed (I was in another school) I just assumed we’d get married after she finished. But she discovered that she hated research, and dreaded a career where she was forced to do it. So, we got married well before we expected to.
And I agree about not staying home forever. Even in the early '60s my mother went back to work when my brother and I were big enough to stay home by ourselves after school.

128

I’m 40 and this is my wife’s situation. She is on her way to become Pilates instructor :cool:

129

I’ve noticed that, too. I thought feminism was about giving women the freedom to do as they choose, not the responsibility to work 40 hours a week in addition to looking after a household and kids.

130

At least in my case, my parents’ brainwashing was probably influenced by watching what happened to divorced and widowed women in India. My father married my mother because she was career oriented and would have been able to support his (their) kids in the event anything happened to him. This is also partially why I am not inclined to look favourably upon or agree to a marriage where my spouse stayed at home.

Probably for the best if the career harridans just marry each other and raise rotten children, right? :wink:

131

Did you just say that a man can’t possibly assist in running a household and has no responsibility to do so? Surely you did not say that.

I would feel guilty noodling around at my hobbies while my husband worked. He has lots of things he’d rather do than a 9-5 job, why do I get to live a part-time life and not him? Ergo, we both work, and both keep house, so we can both retire early.

132

My partners (I don’t do marriage and I’m poly) have to work or otherwise come up with a scheme to acquire income or necessary resources. I am not a breadwinner. I don’t do breadwinner. I do my best to carry my share of the load.

133

I don’t do marriage and I don’t do breadwinner. You must be a real peach!

134

I’m in the same position right now, I’m a stay-at-home-wife, and I find PLENTY to do while not working outside the home. (Right now I can’t work at a job because I have elderly, ailing relatives and I am the ONLY one they can call if they need to be driven to the doctor’s, the grocery store, the drugstore, to go over and help them out with yard and home chores. I never know, they have good days and bad days, but here I am, on-call, day and night, never knowing when I’ll have to drop everything because one of them needs help of some sort.) I’ve enjoyed being at home! My days go by fast, especially when I go do some of my volunteer work. Our house is paid for, and I don’t WANT a lot of stupid shit like big TVs, fancy clothes, a new car every other year, jewelry (my needs are more than met, my wants are minimal). So Mr. Sali goes to his good paying job, and we live comfortably off what he makes - there’s no NEED for me to work unless I wanted to (but again, I have obligations that would make that difficult). We’re both good with that, and have been lucky he has that good job.

I only said what are middle class women supposed to do at home because I myself hear “what do you DO all day long at home” from young working women. As if I sleep until 10 a.m. and eat bon-bons and watch TV until my lord and master comes home for his hot meal!.. Well, I worked since age 15, got married, had a kid, was a SAHM, worked a bit more, and now I am happily out of the working world. Don’t need the money, will leave it to the young and ambitious. But I still have value as a person. I’m useful to my friends, family, relatives. I’m not a leech, living off my husband, I get a lot done, not having to be somewhere from 8 till 4 every day.

135

About having enough money… what salinqmind said. We’re also fortunate in that both of us don’t NEED to work. It’s the advantage of being a little older… our house and cars are paid off, which removes a major financial burden. We don’t pay for cable or satellite or a video gaming system or data plans for smartphones. We eat out, eh, maybe once every two weeks, and that’s at $8 entree restaurants. We rarely go to movies in theaters. We don’t buy coffee at Starbucks. There are a million little trappings of the upper-middle-class lifestyle that we just don’t care for. And, boom, suddenly living is pretty cheap.

And I’m confident I won’t have trouble keeping busy. College wasn’t a huge time-sink for me and I kept myself happily busy then; now I have a house with a kitchen and a craft room, and a car to drive wherever I want, plus I’m about to have an infant to take care of. No problemo, I’m sure I’ll feel that I don’t have enough time.

For people who find their jobs honestly fulfilling, I can believe that having both marriage partners working full time, and getting the household stuff done on evenings and weekends, can be just fine. Neither my husband nor I really enjoy our jobs (though he likes his workplace, and I loathe mine), and feel that between working and taking care of the house, there’s little time to do what we actually want to be doing. Having me stay home and get most of the housework out of the way while he’s at work will free up time for both of us.

136

It’s not that they can’t, it’s that they don’t. Of course this is a broad generalization, and it may be less true for younger men and women, but for women of my generation and older (I’m almost 44), there is still a lot of the attitude of men “helping out” with housework and childcare duties. That’s not even getting into other cultures where men really aren’t expected to take any responsibility for household and childcare duties (i.e. most of the rest of the world).

137

::trying to remember if ‘peach’ is among the recent endearments::

Seriously, none of my partners is looking for a guy who wants to do all that traditional shit. They want other things from guys, some of which pertains to stability and reliability and being an equal partner in a lot of ways that, according to them, most males whether modern or old-fashioned tend to fall short. Including as Cat Whisperer points out, doing their share of the domestic stuff.

The guys who do breadwinner expect to be in charge, expect deferral and whatnot. The people who do marriage are generally not open to their partners being poly. They’ve mostly had their fill of those kind of guys.

138

Not married, but in a long-enough term relationship to answer the question.

The idea that I could affect her choices about working is pretty laughable. She’ll have a career, and take no more than a few years off to raise kids, if any time at all. That’s true whether she were with me or someone else. It’s also pretty plausible that she’ll earn more than me her entire life; I work in the arts and she’s a math-and-science type. I might be secretly emasculated, just a little, if she makes way more than me, but I’m sure I’ll get over it.

139

:confused: More power to you, but for the sake of clarity, whatever arrangements you’re talking about here (and they sound like very, very old fashioned arrangements indeed) don’t have much relevance to the context of marriage I’m asking about.

140

I’m 32, male, and have been with my wife for nearly 9 years. We have a 3 month old baby. In all of the time we have been together, she has almost never worked. This has actually worked out really well for us, though our situation was entirely unintentional. I couldn’t care less whether she makes any money at all.

We met while she was in college; I am only a few years older than she is. She had planned on a career working with disabled children. She had some health issues, but it didn’t seem like anything insurmountable and she’s a real trooper. But shortly after we met, her problems became very serious practically overnight. She had a few rounds of surgery and was debilitated for months. Though we had only met three or four months prior to this, I invited her to move in with me, quit my job at the time since I had a fair chunk of change saved up, and took care of her for six months or so. It sounds completely insane, and people in my life at the time certainly thought so. But goddamn it, I knew it was right and we are still incredibly happy after nearly a decade.

The surgery created almost as many problems as it solved. She was in near-constant pain and got serious infections regularly. She all but gave up her career aspirations and just focused on trying to feel good and take care of both of us. I need a fair bit of caretaking, since I work far too much and drive myself way too hard. She is a gifted artist and before our son was born, spent most of her time creating. She doesn’t even like to sell her work; she gives it away to friends, family, and occasionally even random people she meets. We have a wonderful quality of life: she would have to make a hell of a lot of money for it to be worth sacrificing. I make enough money to support us both comfortably, and I am more than happy to do so. We exactly live the high life, though we do own an apartment in Manhattan. I have a lot of books and some fancy booze, and she has a lot of materials for her art. Honestly, that’s pretty much all we need. I’ve been saving pretty consistently for the long term since I graduated college, and I am fortunate to be in a career where I pretty much never have to retire. Nor would I want to, to be honest.

My wife is certainly more involved with the day-to-day care of my son. She had a remarkably successful pregnancy and has shown far more endurance than she even expected of herself. She was sleeping perhaps 3 hours a day for the first two months or so. I would have crashed and burned within a week or two.

The pregnancy actually mitigated many of her persistent problems, so she is thinking that once our son gets a little older, she might give some of her old career aspirations a shot. This is a pretty big deal since her illness and subsequent disability was so demoralizing for her. I’d be thrilled if she feels ready to give it a shot, but if not, no problem. More time for the two of us.