Angry Wives with a Plan
If you recall, Parenting Magazine published a piece in January called Mad at Dad. They did a good job riling up the masses of women who are fed up with their lives in large part because they feel burdened with the roles of primary parent, homemaker, and often co-breadwinner as well. I have to admit that this would get me mad as well. At the time, we blogged about this piece with some suggestions for moms.
Since then, Parenting Magazine has garnered their own advice for moms to get past the anger. We were honored to toss in our opinions and really like the resulting piece released this week. Here are a couple points from some of our favorite mentors:
"First, recognize that equality is an attainable goal," says Francine M. Deutsch.
"You want to feel like you're solving things together instead of having dump-on-Dad time," says Pepper Schwartz, Ph.D.
Luckily, we don't sound too shabby either:
"Involve your husband as your partner, not your employee. Ultimately, this is a gift to your children," says Marc Vachon. "Moms and dads are different, but they both need to be equally valued," he says.
"The more you can build the sharing into your schedule, the less it becomes a contentious issue," says Amy Vachon
Hopefully, this will get people focusing on the solutions instead of the problem.
posted by Marc @ 8:21 PM
4 Comments:
I feel that anger sometimes too, a piece on you (i believe in the nytimes about a year ago) was actually a starting point for my husband and i getting our act together and cooperatively taking responsibility for raising our daughter as a team. i am really looking forward to your book and wanted to say thanks!
It's a good article but they still miss a key point. There was this comment:
"It's a tough world out there for moms. We're surrounded by Judgy McJudgersons who jump down our throats if our kids have a meltdown in the cereal aisle, and if the thank-you notes don't get written, we're the ones who are viewed as disorganized -- not our husbands."
But women are the ones who are doing the judging! If women don't want to be judged on their parenting and household management, then just stop judging each other. It's really pretty simple.
Dennis, You have a very valid point. What really got a lot of fathers though is that, how would mothers react if a magazine did an article about how Dads are made at Mom? The media continues to feed into the problems rather than focusing on the positives that are happening. We see too much focus on everything Mom does, while still calling Dads deadbeats, despite the facts that more Mothers are behind on child support than Fathers as a percentage. Sorry, tangent, lol. We need shared parenting laws passed in every state, and we need more Mothers to step up to the plate and LET Dad be a father. There is a new book out about the "Superior Wife Syndrome", ugh, it makes me wants to rip my hair out. Anyway, thanks for working towards shared parenting!
Ugh -- the premise of that book does look terrible.
I wonder, though, if the only way some people will respond positively to advice is if it's presented in terms of, "how to prevent your complete awesomeness and your spouse's complete suckitude from destroying your marriage."
Interesting also that the "quiz" on the website has nothing about tasks that typically fall to men in traditional set-ups -- earning money, home and car mantienance, etc.
It's like Lake Woebegone -- every wife is superior!
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