"Plan" to become a wife..plan requires another person..

[BriarRose1122]

Spin off from the thread "Crushing your daughters dreams in just a few simple steps" :( Poor Haley who would probably really enjoy college courses. :(

Ok so my topic. I personally would LOVE to "just" be a wife and be mom to a whole house full of kids, and if don't know for sure that I'd homeschool, maybe not, but I'd absolutely love that too. If it happens. I'm not married, engaged, or even dating anyone at the moment..though I've been in several relationships, i just have not met the right guy yet.

But, this is okay, because if it doesn't happen, or until it does happen, I have a college education and I use my degree in my field of work and support myself.

And, if at some point I meet the right guy and logistics work out for me to be a stay at home mom and possibly homeschool, well, that'll be great.

But I also know it may not happen.

And if it doesn't, well, yes I'll be bummed, but, I will be okay.

I will enjoy my career and I will have a life of my own.

So me and Haley both want to end up as wives and homeschooling moms.

But what if it doesn't happen? I'll be okay. But what will Haley do? My thinking is...you can't PLAN to be a wife and mom. You can't plan on doing something that requires another person for the plan to work

Because what if there ISNT another person? Being a wife requires having someone to marry and be your husband. If you don't have this other person, your plan doesn't work.

Any other type of plan for life- being a teacher, doctor, lawyer etc doesn't require another person to make it happen. But planning to become a wife DOES depend on someone else. You can't just plan to be a wife. You have to have a husband first. You have to meet the right person for you, and that's something you really can't plan.

I know there are lots of fundie girls that haven't dated (courted?) yet or maybe aren't looking, who knows. Sarah Maxwell, the Botkins girls, etc. I know the families all say they have plans for unmarried daughters which include living at home forever and having "marketable skills" :liar: but if your PLAN is to become a wife and mother....do you end up having to just marry any guy that takes an interest in you?

You may not be all that crazy about him, but, if that is your plan and it hasn't happened yet and you're getting older and...do you think these girls settle or are pressured to "like" any guy that meets with parents approval because at some point they realize that their plans can't happen if they don't just get married to someone, anyone, just to be married?

Long winded I know.

I know on this forum you've talked about girls having a back up plan and stuff but my issue is with the words they use..."planning to be a wife and mother"...you can't plan on something that requires another person to make the plan work.

[salex]

I believe more and more the emphasis is being put on how marriage is not supposed to be about happiness, but about following God's will-- and this is for both men and women (Voddie what's his name preaches on it often-- and a few of the Dominionists are all over it) So, it isn't about finding the right person, it is about marrying, having kids and obeying God by being in the role of wife and mother. I have been told more than once that if a man and woman are obedient to their roles in marriage, they will have a successful marriage (I gather that means, they will not divorce, since it isn't allowed)

I always wonder what is different between marrying your son or daughter off to the first age appropriate christian whose father agrees with your family's patriarch or what the moonies were doing in their big mass weddings. But, if reproduction is the goal, and happiness is nice but not required, finding a mate is little more than using a list of characteristics you want, rather like breeding cattle or horses....

Or, dying a virgin like Sarah Maxwell may.

[lilith]

A lot of the fundies, the Duggars and Sarah Maxwell included, often say they plan to be a wife and mother "if that is what God has planned for me". So they acknowledge that God may not plan for all women to be married, but don't equip themselves for anything else. It's crazy.

I suspect that they all really do think that Prince Charming will land on their door steps though, and only tack on the "if God wills it for me" to appease those who are asking why they aren't married yet, especially in the case of Poor Sarah.

[TrueRebel1]

This very quandary is what opened my eyes to the possibility that all the fundie-ism I believed in may not, in fact, be legitimate and logical. At 18 years old, I was at a stand-still. I could go no farther in my life. I "planned" on being a wife and mother, but I couldn't take a step further without a young man being in the picture! I felt so immature when I came in contact with "normal" girls who were taking the grown-up steps of getting jobs and heading off to college. I realized that I would be wasting away my life until (and if) prince charming ever showed up on my doorstep. Sadly, I was so brainwashed by fundie beliefs that over the next 5 years until I DID marry, I wasn't able to make much progress in turning my single life into something good. But I am grateful in many ways that I wasn't able to marry at 18, because I don't think my eyes would have been opened for a long time, if at all.

[alba]

When you think about it, career goals do require another person or people. Someone has to accept you to university (if it's necessary for your career), your teachers have to teach you, someone's got to invite you to an interview and offer you a job. Other people have to pay for services (or pay their taxes) so you get paid and keep your job.

The difference is that these are, by and large, impersonal interactions. They're about having the grades or the skills to perform a specific task and, while some fundies do regard marriage in much the same way, by and large they are still seeking a degree of personal compatibility. As for the rest of us, well, we're not looking for someone who will impregnate us and bring home the money.

Besides that, building a career involves more action on your part to increase your chances. No one, not even the fundiest of fundies, sends out dozens of CVs to potential suitors (well, I wouldn't put it past Raquel ...), but that's exactly what you do to get a job. The best you can do to find a husband is to socialise and try to meet people, which isn't exactly easy when you're a stay-at-home-sister-mom.

[Howl]

Or you make a career out of emotional incest being a SAHD, like the Botkins......

[Maggie Mae]

When I was a teenager, I wanted nothing more than to have the high school sweetheart relationship, which turned into a marriage. Only I never found anyone. The guys at my school were assholes. I had a reputation (which wasn't remotely true, but whatever.) I finally did find someone my senior year, and I wasn't "good enough" for him, because my family wasn't "good enough" in the sense that I lived in the wrong part of town and didn't go to the "right" Catholic Church.

It's a sad fact of life that SOME people are very much non-emotional thinkers when it comes to marriage & relationships. It happens in religious communities and non religious communities. I see so many men look at women and discuss how their girlfriend is a good choice because she comes from this family and has the "right" degree and how she will never embarrass him at company functions. I just find it so depressing that despite having the "right" background, I have the "wrong" last name, and because I'm not close with my family I'm an "auto out."

[louisa05]

A couple I taught with at the Christian school has a daughter who went super conservative on them, bought into courtship and patriarchy and the whole thing. She dropped out of college, announcing that she was called by God to just be a wife and mother. Her parents told her they could not support her in the mean time and that they believed dating is appropriate and necessary and would not participate in the whole courtship thing. She moved in with a family from the church that drug her down this path and was their au pair of sorts. A failed courtship followed.

I have no idea what her situation is these days. All I know is that she is around 35 and still unmarried. And not living with her parents.

[nastyhobbitses]

Pretty much this. I'm 22 (which is getting into spinster age in fundie world) with a college degree and a steady job (yeah, yeah, I'm one lucky millennial), and while I'd certainly like to get married and maybe have a kid or two at some point, and I think sometimes about the logistics of those things (since I very well might not get a whole lot of fixed income from Uncle Sam once I'm of retirement age, and then there's stuff like planning out college funds for my hypothetical children...and as an avid watcher of Say Yes to the Dress I've certainly planned out the sort of wedding dress I'd want), I don't "plan" it like I plan out my career trajectory and finances. And besides that, getting married and starting a family is not a priority for me now, and probably won't be until the opportunity arises. I can't imagine sitting around uneducated and unemployed waiting for some guy to decide to make me his baby vending machine.

[Coco]

Any other type of plan for life- being a teacher, doctor, lawyer etc doesn't require another person to make it happen. But planning to become a wife DOES depend on someone else. You can't just plan to be a wife. You have to have a husband first. You have to meet the right person for you, and that's something you really can't plan.

Not to mention the weird interpersonal maneuvering that believing in this type of life "planning" causes in fundie youth groups. All the guys feel like targets and all the girls feel like they have to merchandise themselves. :lol: And every little conversation raises eyebrows.

[louisa05]

Not to mention the weird interpersonal maneuvering that believing in this type of life "planning" causes in fundie youth groups. All the guys feel like targets and all the girls feel like they have to merchandise themselves. :lol: And every little conversation raises eyebrows.

You think that's bad, try the young adult singles groups at fundy-lite churches. Women typically outnumber men and there is wicked competition for any available man. New women are looked at with trepidation depending on how attractive they are, and new men are like bait thrown in a fish tank. A sane friend of mine at the Christian school called them singles bars for Christians. Except that it is the same group of people at every event and high school like cliques and power games develop, too. Fun times for everyone. Or not.

[nokidsmom]

You think that's bad, try the young adult singles groups at fundy-lite churches. Women typically outnumber men and there is wicked competition for any available man. New women are looked at with trepidation depending on how attractive they are, and new men are like bait thrown in a fish tank. A sane friend of mine at the Christian school called them singles bars for Christians. Except that it is the same group of people at every event and high school like cliques and power games develop, too. Fun times for everyone. Or not.

This reminds me of things at the evangelical Christian college I attended. Most of them were students whose parents attended same college and met their spouses there, so the women seeking their Mrs. degree was a true thing. There were a number of steady couples, if not actually engaged, but were "assumed" to get married some day. And then there were the single, unattached people. That's where it got interesting, because the guys were terrified of dating because a date came with a lot of expectations from the young women. There was even an article written in the student newspaper about the horrible state of dating at the college. My junior year and first part of my senior year were a dating desert and I ended up just writing off any guys at the college and looked elsewhere.