Topic : 12/28 Wifestyles

Seems to me every time I post, you follow. 

You keep saying I feel a way I don't, so I won't respond to any more of your posts. 

Yay!  Congratulations! 

I am glad you agree. 

Diana (from the show) 

I haven't read his posts here, but from the show, I thought towards the end he was starting to get it.  Now, he certainly has a long way to go, but the first step to solving any problem is to acknowledge it.  If he watches the show over and over like Dr. Phil suggested, then maybe one of those times it will hit him between the eyes!  I agree he seemed focused on the wrong thing entirely, which is the problem.  He just needs to be reprogrammed.  The fact that he was on the show in itself is a sign that he wants to try.  Kelly seems like she really loves him and all he really needs to do is to start appreciating her and let her do her job the way she thinks is best.  I really hope for his sake, and for their marriage and family's sake  that he will see things through our eyes and begin to realize that his expectations are totally unrealistic and demeaning to his wife.  Like the rest of you, I wanted to shake some sense into him!    Kelly is a beautiful woman with a caring heart and is doing a great job and he needs to learn to appreciate her!  I would love to see a follow up on them in a few months with him totally horrified at his 'former' self and begging for her forgiveness!!  Then, Dr. Phil should send them on a second honeymoon so they can start over (I love happy endings.........) 

After seeing some of the feedback I can say that I feel extremely lucky to have the wonderful husband that I do.  He treats me like a princess, every day.  He makes sure that I know that he appreciates what I do for him and for our family.  By Dr. Phil's measure, I can say that my husband is definitely doing his job right!!  God bless him, he doesn't expect me to be perfect-- and he overlooks my shortcomings just like I overlook his.  For our anniversary last year, he hired a limousine and paid for an entire day at the spa for both me and my sister.  Grant, I hope you're taking notes, buddy!  I think that Dr. Phil can help turn you around before it's too late!! 

Me and My husband have been married for 3 years. We have a son who is 2 1/2 years old, and we are expecting baby number 2. My husband works a full time job. He is out of the house from 6am - 6pm and that is not during busy season. I work as a part time teacher. I am out of my house from 9am - 5pm. As you can see I get home one hour before my husband.  

I have to agree with Diana on the show. I am a mother, a wife, and a teacher. I am also a daughter, granddaughter, and sister. It is very very difficult to give everything my all. I am not the best mother I can be, I am not the best wife, and I am not the best teacher. I do what I am able to do and try not to focus on my deficiencies. I always tell my husband something always has to give. If I come home late and want dinner on the table for my husband, that means my son has to sit in front of a DVD instead of me sitting with him. Someone always gets slighted. 

I have had many discussions with my husband and thank god he has been very understanding and reasonable. 

1) I made a list of things that need to be done around the house (ex: having the beds made, kitchen clean, bedroom clean, go to bed at the same time as my husband, etc). I then asked my husband to number the list from most important to least important.  This way I was able to do the chores around the house that he wanted, and not what I wanted. Men and women have different ideas of what around the house is important. If you make sure your husband's wishes are fulfilled he will live his life to fill his wife's wishes. This has nothing to do with feminism or becoming someone's servant. 

2) I told my husband that I am not his mother. We all look at our parents who have been married and a made couple for 20-30 years. Their houses run smoothly, meals taste good, and there is order. However that took 20-30 years to accomplish. When you put a ring on your finger it doesn't automatically mean that I know what a wife is suppose to do. 

3) I told him that in order to have dinner on the table when he comes home, in order to be a good mother, and in order for me to do my job well (which in turn will make me enjoy and want to work) I do not have time to clean the house. My husband agreed and we have a housekeeper come twice a week for 4 hours to help out. He was realistic. He didn't want me stressing but at the same time he wanted a clean house. He realized you cant have it all. 

I do not look at myself as someone who is subservient to their spouse. I love him and want to do for him. I want to make him happy. I want to respect and keep his wishes. He feels the same way. He loves me, he is realistic, and he doesn't want to overwork me. So just like many things in marriage there is a give and take, you just have to decide what is really important.  

And just to reiterate what Dr. Phil said on the show, each spouse needs to feel like they have the best spouse. That despite the minor faults that your spouse may have they still treat you the best, they love you, and would do anything for you. 

My advice to all couples is to be realistic. You need to help your spouse be the best that they can be, and not what you want them to be. When you date you should know what you want for a wife/husband. If your expectations are too high you will never marry so make sure they are realistic. Dating is to learn what potential your spouce has. If they don't have that potential then don't marry them cause you will only make both of your lives difficult.  

It's true there are a lot of things that make us human and being a mother for a woman is one of the roles assigned to her by nature. We say that it's natural and healthy to eat, sleep, move a lot, have sex... Well, getting pregnant is just as natural. Over years people have learned to control the process of getting pregnant and it's a great accomplishment. But voluntarily bringing it to a halt seems like giving up to me.  

I think that those people (men and women) who choose not to have kids are setting their minds for a failure. It's as if they are saying "I'm not good enough to produce more people like me. I don't like my DNA. I don't want to continue my generation. Sure since I was born I'll do something with my life and maybe make other people happy and maybe make a huge contribution with my work to the mankind so that others can have better lives. But I voluntarily sacrifice my chance of staying in the game of life and a race for survival." 

We talk a lot about accepting who we are. But are those women who choose not to have kids (not to get pregnant) not accepting their bodies and DNAs the nature gave them? We say we have to reach our potential in life. Do those women decide not to use this gift of nature, this opportunity, meaning they don't reach their bodies' full potential? We teach all around us to never give up. But don't those women give up in the natural competition of DNA survival? That makes me think that for a woman deciding not to have kids not because she can't (and I feel very sorry for those who want to, but can't), but because she doesn't think it's important for her, is not healthy. 

It is a slightly different thing for a man, because he is not the one getting pregnant. In nature where he hasn't been given any control over his mate's body, it's even more natural for him to assume that he will be a father as long as he is having sex with young females. But again, if a man chooses to have protected sex nowadays, he chooses to control this process. And if on the top of that he chooses not to have kids, that to me also sounds unhealthy. In other words, I think choosing to control and to plan your parenthood is a great idea, but choosing to give it up is nothing less than giving up on yourself. 

There is also a timing issue involved here. Men were given an advantage here (bastards!). They can make kids from puberty until they die, but women have only a window of 20 years or so to make all the kids they decide to have. I'm talking about ages from about 20 to 40 years while the woman's body can do it's best to have healthy children. So if a man decides not to have kids, but suddenly changes his mind at 75 like David Letterman, he still has a shot. But for a woman this decision is irreversible when she looses this battle to time.  

And even 40 is too late for most women. I've been told by many doctors that the most healthy age to have the first child is 20-23. It's not just about getting pregnant which with new methods (like freezing your eggs etc.) could be delayed until a woman is 50 or so. It's also about a woman's body getting old and less capable of carrying a healthy baby into the world with time. 

And even that is not it. OK, the baby is born and healthy. If his parents are getting old on the plus side they are getting wise and more settled (presumably), but on the minus side they loose their energy with age. It's not enough for them to make a kid, they have to give this kid a good start in life too so that this kid has a better chance of spreading his DNA around. (I know putting in these words sounds blunt, but we are all creatures of mother nature, aren't we? Denying this fact doesn't make it any less of a fact.) And if you are David Letterman and make a lot of money you can sort of hire someone to be a parent for your child if you become sick and fragile with age. But for a 35-year-old supermarket manager with the goal to become a head manager by the age of 50 and then have kids the picture is different. 

I'd like to conclude with a very strong statement here. If some say that not having kids is a choice, I can't agree more. It is a choice. Only in my point of view it's a loser's choice and unhealthy! 

Men can rear children.  Men can be loving and nurturing.  Some women aren't loving and nurturing-it doesn't just come with the vagina. 

Men are a much better parent than the mother in LOTS of families.  In a lot of cases though, men don't get involved in child care, possibly through choice because it isn't supported in our society and possibly because the mommy maniac wouldn't let him parent. Our society marginalizes men as parents.   

My husband is a wonderful father and I think that it partially came about because I was very sick after my first child. I was in the hospital from her 3rd month to her 5th month.  He was alone raising her and they were a pretty tight little team when I came home, so I understand how hard it can be to break in.  

Children need a mom AND a dad.  Your type of attitude about fatherhood is one of the reasons men are marginalized as parents.  Children are not served by this sexism that pushes them to the sidelines. 

Dear Diana 

Thank you for everything you shared while on stage with Dr. Phil.  I gave up the "corporate" world in order to be a full time stay at home mother and wife.  You are so right in stating how thin you become when you try to give 100% to a job and 100% to a family.  At first the transition was difficult and with nearly one year under my belt as being at home full time, I cannot believe I wasted so many years punching someone else's time clock.   

I would love your "menu for a year" tips.  Please share how you started such wonderful organization with regards to meal planning.  Thanks so much and God Bless 

dmpeetz@hotmail.com 

You're shocked! 

The point is more about being a wife than being a mother. 

These are two different things in my opinion. 

A mother should definitely be a mother first, leading her children to successful and independent lives showing by her example and good instruction etc.  My children have come back to me on several occasions and expressed thanks for showing them by my example that they can be successful and that it is up to them to make things work. 

However a wife is in my experience a woman who has signed legal papers and taken mutual vows to be each others one and only as far as love and respect go etc. 

Before you got married and lived in different places, you both had to pick up after yourselves, feed yourselves, keep up with your laundry, shop, clean, pay your bills and earn an income.  Then why should a man stop these things after marriage and wife take on his burdens as well as her own.  To top it off, after a child comes into it, wife is now fully responsible for care and upkeep of the child, her husband and herself. 
 

Anytime, and I made this point loud and clear to my own children, (to help them be better adults) that anyone does anything for you that you could have done for yourself, that has been above and beyond their call of duty.  If I do the laundry for us, because I want to, doesn't that deserve gratitude. 

If I see my husband burdened by his duties, duties which I cannot help with, then I can choose to lighten his load by helping with more than my share of chores.  If he sees me burdened by my duties in life, duties which he cannot relieve me of, then he can choose to help lighten my load by doing more than his share of chores.  We appreciate each other so much more.  I love to lighten his load and he mine.  It is friendship, companionship, partnership.  There are no rules here about who does what.  It is as the Bible says, "bear ye one anothers burdens and so fulfil the law of Christ."
  You don't show appreciation by criticizing the one who serves you.  Neither do you show honor and respect by abandoning the one who has chosen to be your lifes partner. 

  We will never have peace in our relationships until we stop making rules for each other. 

  We can't be judging the other wives and mothers, doesn't mean that I agree with them for myself. 

  I pursued a career while raising my children, my children's father had long abandoned us mentally and physically.  We were on our own.  At first the children were too small for me to leave alone, but once they got bigger, yes, I had to go for the career.  Someone had to pay for living expenses.  I didn't have a husband, so this was not a wife choice, this was a mother choice. 

  After I married again I continued to work long hours until they were grown up and on their own.  This was still a mother choice.  When my children feel sorry for themselves it ends when they begin to think about me.   

  Now I'm going to be a stay at home mother, raising a new little one.  I'm looking forward to it.  But I can assure you it is not a wife decision it is a mother decision that I made.  I also plan to pursue my own interests, being a mom first, but organizing myself carefully to fulfil my long put aside goals.   

This is me.   

My mother and grandmother was not out fighting for womens rights, in fact, they were at home raising my mother and me!! HELLO! You want to get your point across that women should do what they want......this is what some of us want. I have a college degree, and I had a very rewarding career before I had my daughter, but i find NOTHING as rewarding as knowing I'M THE ONLY ONE RAISING MY DAUGHTER AND I'M THE ONLY ONE TAKING CARE OF MY HUSBAND!!!!!!! In fact, I did go back to work but  why have children if your just going to pawn them off on someone else to raise? I love with all my heart being able to take my daughter to school, pick her up, and have dinner on the table for my husband who works 70 plus hours a week in order to give us what we have. My husband appreciates me more than anyone ever has......he makes sure I have plenty of  time for just me, or for what I want.....but you know what?? 99% of the time when my husband comes home and says "Honey, you have outdone yourself....why don't I watch our daughter and you go to the spa this weekend?" my reply is almost always...."NO, I would rather spend that time with my daughter and husband!!" My husband is probably the hardest worker I have ever known.....even when he is at home, he is constantly asking me what he can do to help......so to me, what is wrong with making his life easier because he does just that for me by working and providing for us!! There is no difference in me wanting to please my husband and you wanting to please your boss. The only difference is, I'm almost positive my husband appreciates it more than any boss could.