Loving Wives Are Not Doormats

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The feministas came out of their skins when I published my best seller, “The Proper Care & Feeding of Husbands.”  Their main point of rage was their notion that taking care of one’s man emotionally and physically was demeaning.

One reader, Vicky, wrote this week:
“Last December, we invited potential friends to our Christmas party.  During the evening, I gave my husband a fresh drink when I saw that his was getting low.  At one point, the man we invited noticed and commented that he’d go thirsty if he waited for his wife to bring him a drink.  The wife, in turn, bluntly let me know that’s because she wasn’t a doormat.  I responded that I never thought I was a doormat just because I enjoyed taking care of my man, and the conversation moved on.  But, I have to admit, that comment ate at me for a long time.  Was I being naïve?  Was my husband taking advantage of me?

Over the months since, every time I hear my husband tell a friend that I take better care of him than he deserves, I let that comment “go” a little bit more.  I’ve now let it go completely. You see, we ran into that couple this past weekend.  We’d heard rumors that they were divorcing (because the husband had had an affair).  The wife confirmed the rumors, but stated that they were trying to work it out. I’m doubtful they will work anything out.  She’s the ultimate “feminazi,” and he will have to do all the changing and groveling for it to “work out.”

Bottom line:  She’s on her way to divorce, and I’m celebrating my 7 year wedding anniversary today with a man who worships me and I absolutely adore after all these years.  Doormat?  I think not! 

Make Dinner Every Night

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Today, I’m turning my blog over to Lisa, a listener who wrote me the following email:

I called [your radio show] today to ask you about making dinner for my husband every night, and how I could get him to take a part in it.  Your response was “make dinner every night.”  When I got off the phone, I thought:  ‘I don’t want to make dinner every night.’

I was one of those women [who] swore I would never not agree with you.  Boy, it’s a little harder when you are the one getting advice!  I have to admit, I was a bit ticked.  I called you so you could tell me to have him make dinner, not for me to still be “stuck” with the responsibility.

As I sit here typing, I am laughing at myself.  Silly, silly me!  I had an epiphany.  My epiphany came from you saying ‘We CHOOSE every day what we do,’ and I thought ‘Okay, then I will CHOOSE to do dinner every night’ as a way of saying ‘thank you’ to my hubby, who has always worked so hard to provide me a home, a safe place, and a caring heart.  This wasn’t an acceptance of defeat [like] I had lost some battle.

What I had accomplished was CHOOSING my marriage.  Not to pat myself on the back or to receive accolades for making dinner every night, but to CHOOSE the role of serving and loving my hubby in this area (i.e., food).  Sometimes, roles are fun, adventurous, sexy and admired, and sometimes, those roles are the ‘make the dinner late, dust the house and clean the toilets when I’m so tired’ kind of roles.

I got really excited [about making] a fabulous meal, knowing that even without a ‘thank you,’ I would be CHOOSING to do this for him.  I didn’t need a thank you, because I was seeing it as an accountability point.  I chose my marriage, I chose to be a wife, I choose to work full time, I choose, I choose, I choose.  The one thing I wasn’t choosing was being accountable for those choices.  With choices come responsibility.

Countless friends and family have shown me the ‘don’t take that path’ way of being married.  I don’t want to give 50% — I want to give 150% so that no woman will take that role away from me.  I want to create a place that will be the only home he’ll ever come home to, the only lips he’ll ever kiss, the only laundromat he’ll ever take his clothes to….and while I’m at it, I might as well make some darn good dinners, even if it’s spaghetti with red sauce every night!

Thank you again for who you inspire women to become!

Thankfully,

Lisa

4,914 Sex Sessions

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With all the controversy about inappropriate sex (single women having babies out-of-wedlock on purpose, child sexual abuse in various religious orders, kids performing oral sex in middle school classrooms, etc.), it’s nice to know that I can share with you a positive, healthy, and utterly lovely sexual story.

Nancy K (I’m protecting her privacy!) wrote:
I’d like to respond to your radio program caller who, sadly, had sex with his wife about once every three to six months due to an over-packed lifestyle.  I’ve been married for 27 years to a great guy.  We’ve had our ups and downs-family troubles, kid troubles, you name it - some of them pretty devastating,  but our marriage has survived due to commitment, faith in God, and the intimacy that holds us together when the storms hit.

Since I can remember, we have sex every other day…yes, you read correctly.  Barring serious illness or surgery, even during the early years when our kids were young, through the teen years when we had kids all over the house, and now through the college years when my kids come home to visit, we have kept this pattern.  It has not always been easy!  Sometimes, we need to be creative.
We have a lock on our door, and a television in the bedroom as a sound buffer.  We have even “snuck” away from our home for a quick evening in a local, cheap hotel, and returned before bedtime, all for the price of a dinner and a movie out.  Sometimes, he drops by at lunch, if he’s out on a customer call, or I meet him.

I estimate that to be approximately 4,914 sessions!  Mind you, not all of these times are steamy hours of sex.  Some last only minutes, but the connection is there, and I can say with confidence that I challenge anything or anyone to come between us, because we are truly one.

When marriages allow all the intimacy to be sucked out of their lives, they will not have anything to cling to when trouble comes, and it will come in some form during your marriage.  I don’t always feel like having sex, but I always feel like being close to him, and by seeing the best in my man, respecting him and his needs, and honoring him.  I find that I can almost always get “in the mood” because he values me.

My hubby bought me “The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands” as a little gift one day - and I read it and loved it.  I picked up some new pointers, and used it as a refresher course to jump-start an already-good marriage.

I quoted this letter in full because I believe that the most devastating aspect of a marriage is one in which the spouses take each other for granted, serve their own moods or desires, and don’t wake up every day wondering what they can do to make the other’s life worth living.

Marriage Matters to Children

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The Claremont Institute (http://www.claremont.org/) recently published two book reviews having to do with the significance of marriage to the well-being of children, and the cohesiveness of society in general.  The books reviewed are:  “Marriage and Caste in America:  Separate and Unequal Families in a Post-Marital Age,” by Kay S. Hymowitz, and “The Future of Marriage,” by David Blankenhorn.

These are two fascinating and informational books that you ought to read.  The reviewer, F. Carolyn Graglia, writes:  “Over the past four decades, American adults have seemed more concerned with enjoying their own existence than with the generation and welfare of children.” And in her book, Hymowitz writes:  “Children of single mothers are less successful on just about every measure than children growing up with their married parents regardless of their income, race, or educational levels:  they are more prone to drug and alcohol abuse, to crime, and to school failure; they are less likely to graduate from college; they are more likelyl to have children at a young age, and more likely to do so when they are unmarried. Soaring divorce rates and out-of-wedlock births (37% of U. S.  births are illegitimate) have made ours a nation of separate and unequal families.”

The propensity to divorce is apparently correlated with two-income families. Hymowitz notes that the “traditional families, with breadwinner husband and stay-at-home wife had the lowest rate of divorce.”  Women employed 80% of the time since the birth of their first child are twice as likely to be divorced as stay-at-home moms. 

Today, more than 40% of all first marriages end in divorce (the rates for second and third marriages are higher), and more than half of all U.S. children will spend “at least a significant part of their childhood living apart from their father.”

Shacking up, having babies out of wedlock as an entitlement for working women who don’t have the time or inclination to create a marriage, having babies out of wedlock because of irresponsible sexual behavior (and not considering adoption to a two-parent mom and dad)…all of these now-normalized behaviors reek of narcissism and indicate that we worry less about children and more about adults being unfettered by morality, good sense, or compassion to the needs of children.

Strong Marriages = Strong Communities

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Pastor Alexander Hardy, Jr. of the New Dimension Worship Center in Frederick, Maryland banded together with 16 other churches to present Families United ‘08 two weekends ago.  This was a three-day conference for children and adults, including workshops and fun and games.  Sunday was even declared Marriage Day in Frederick, by way of a proclamation from the mayor and aldermen.

The point of this effort was to send a message of hope and perseverance to younger adults.  The religious aspect was not incidental:  one participant said that building a relationship with God has made all the difference in building relationships with his wife and children:  “When we got married, we didn’t know God.  God has taught us to be humble; taught us we don’t always have to be right or have it our way.”

All together, about 350 people attended this event, with six couples renewing their vows in front of their children and community.  Inspiring!

Is “Personal Responsibility” a Four-Letter Word?

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My, my, my.  My comments last week on why many men stray from their marriage vows generated more email to me than any one thing I’ve said in years.  85% of the letters I received were wonderfully appreciative and supportive of what I said.  Men and women alike “got” what I was saying and acknowledged the need for husbands and wives to share the responsibility for the health of their marriages. 

One wrote “After seeing you on The Today Show, I asked myself, ‘Am I the kind of wife my husband wants to come home to?’  I look at each day as an opportunity to honor him.  Thank you for challenging me to have the courage to change.  My husband will never go a day without knowing his wife needs, loves and respects him.”

Another person emailed me because my comments motivated her to look at her own issues with the overall concept of personal responsibility.  This young woman wrote that she was motivated by my comments to stop her methamphetamine addiction:

“I have chosen to quit.  Once you stop feeling like such a victim to some inanimate object (the pipe does not jump into your mouth on its own) you realize your power over it.”

Other folks, though, seemed absolutely apoplectic over my point of view that people need to take responsibility for their lives and their relationships. 

Clearly this is the crux of the problem in this country.  The concept of promoting personal responsibility in a society that encourages victims to stay victims and glamorizes the bad behavior of celebrities and politicians seems to be a hot button that makes some folks’ heads explode.  People tend to hold on to their anger, hurt and depression, especially if they don’t have the tools they need to break out of the cycle of personal self-destruction.

That’s why I wrote Stop Whining, Start Living.  I wrote it because I wanted to help people enjoy their lives more and be more content inside themselves.  None of us can do that if we persist in the self-defeating notion that we are victims… that only leads to complaining and not LIVING.

This book is not for people who want to embrace their problems - it’s for people who want to solve them and move on to a more productive and happy life.  If you want to feel more in control of your situations in families, neighborhoods, jobs, etc., then you first have to look inside yourself and see what YOU are doing that you shouldn’t be… or what you are NOT doing that you should be!  This is where the power to change everything comes in.

Some people won’t ever do this.  They hold on to sadness, victimhood and complaints.  But those who read Stop Whining with an open heart and mind will find the keys - through other people’s real experiences and stories - to make their life easier and more pleasurable; to improve their lives as husbands, wives, parents, and friends, and to discover the joy of being an evolved human being.

Getting letters and calls from people who have taken my advice to stop whining and turn themselves into productive members of society is all the inspiration I need to keep on keeping on.  That’s what puts the smile on my face.

Book signing tonight in Costa Mesa, California:  And if you want to see me really smile and you live in L.A. or Orange County, come on down tonight to the Barnes and Noble at the Metro Pointe Mall in Costa Mesa at 7pm.  I’ll be signing copies of the aforementioned new book, Stop Whining, Start Living for all of you who embrace your own personal responsibility.

Love Speaks When We Can’t

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On Valentine’s Day, I thought it was appropriate to share with you this email from Kathi, one of the listeners to my radio program.

My husband and I have been married for 16 years.  We have one natural child, a boy, 13, and are caring for five others my mom adopted (my mom is a widow).

At the end of last year, my husband was in a motorcycle accident.  He was intubated for three very long days, and hospitalized for seven.  During his silence, I realized a few things:

1. I knew if he never spoke to me again, he loved me and I knew he knew I loved him.
2. I already appreciated him and loved him and cared for him as I should.
3. The reason he was such a wonderful husband was because I treated him as I should and, in return, have always felt and been very loved.

As he lay in the hospital bed and couldn’t speak to me, I realized how much I missed the text messages and the two or three phone calls a day I would get from him, the tap on my rear when I was cooking and he came into the kitchen, and him standing at the door when he comes home every day and we give each other a kiss.  I just wanted to hear him say “I love you,” and when he did it, it was more precious than the day we married. 

I was there every day, of course, and would cry each night when I had to leave him.  I was able to bring him home two days before Thanksgiving, and then continued to care for him for eight more weeks.  I told everyone I was having an 8 week-long vacation with my best friend.  I would take him to doctor visits and to physical therapy.  One of the therapists couldn’t believe I had such a positive attitude, and had such a loving environment in my home.  She had expected to see an exhausted woman and an unclean, unshaven “un-helped” man like she usually saw.  Instead, I was positive and happy and had helped my husband shower and shave and get dressed like I did each morning since the accident.  It seemed the natural thing to do. 

In his times of depression, I encouraged him; in his tears, I comforted him, and now I have released him back into the world fully recovered.  He frequently gets down on his knees and holds my hands and looks me in the eyes, and says “I love you and I trust you with my life.”  He often asked me why I did all this for him.  I looked at him and told him “because I love you and know you would do it for me.”

I have never read one of your books, but have always agreed with you.  I guess the beautiful examples of the proper care and feeding of husbands I had in my life taught me all the things you are trying to teach each caller now.  I hope I am as good an example to my children.  I hope this letter causes someone to appreciate their “best friend” even more.  Thank you for all you do.

Kathi

Letter of Love

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Listener Leslie wrote:

It’s almost Valentine’s Day, so I wanted to tell you about my sweet husband.  We have been married for over two years, and are now hoping to adopt a baby (you wouldn’t believe how long and tedious this process is, but we know it will be worth it!).  He has always supported my decision to be a stay-at-home mother, and we’ve been saving and planning for two years. 

Two weeks ago, after a long day at my stressful job, I came home crying.  My wonderful husband told me to quit my job, stay home, and relax so that I am 100% ready to be a mother. 

Oh, Dr. Laura, what a relief!  Tomorrow is my last day at this job, and every morning for the last two weeks, I have made my husband lunch, and my job is now to make our dollars go as far as possible.  Every night, he has come home to a happy wife, a hug, an “I love you,” and a hot meal.  Oh, how he beams! 

We may not yet have a baby, but I can already say that my husband is his kid’s dad, and I am proud to be his wife.