Why should one NOT get married [Part 2]

[Chapter 2] IN-LAWS

The in-laws will never side with you no matter what they tell you, no matter how NICE they are to you. Never let your guard down. Blood is always thicker than water unless of course if you find a man whose parents aren’t as intrusive as most in laws or better yet, if he’s an orphan. Being the girl, the mother in law will always be the queen of the house and everyone is expected to pay her homage especially the daughter in law. So it is always better to get your own place even before the wedding. If not, the reality is she will always tell you what to do in handling her son, managing your kids, managing your house.

If your husband brings home something for you, there’s a possibility that there’s a “twin” item for his mother. Or else she will resent the fact that her son never beings home anything for her and resent you in the process. The question now is what if your husband doesn’t want to leave the nest? Of course it is unfair because you left your nest to be with him, right? Where is it written than a woman for simply being a woman; should uproot herself to be with her husband?

If I remember correctly, the Bible says that a man shall leave his parent’s house to be with his wife. But that isn’t always the case in our society. It is even worse when a woman refuses to leave her nest and insists that her husband stay with her and her parents. That too is pathetic and unfair to the man. It is always better to be on your own and not be with any in law for that matter even if it’s just a one-room apartment; it’s still your domain.

Another reality no one will discuss with you is the manhandling that goes on within a marriage. Thank the Congress for passing the Marital Rape Law. When a man beats up his wife it is called “a natural occurrence”, it happens, it can’t be helped. This society finds stupid machismo synonymous with wife-beaters. And it is only lately that a wife can send her erring husband to jail for beating her up. When a wife beats up her husband, they call it abuse and abnormal and she ends up in jail if she’s not aware of her rights as a woman and as a wife. When a wife wants to have sex and he doesn’t, she can’t do anything about it unless she wants to be called a slut. When a man wants to have sex and she says no, there are two possibilities. She gets beaten AND raped or she gets replaced. Or worse, both for the same matter.

Child rearing is a woman’s domain. Even if society encourages a man to take part in the daily care of a baby, the woman is still the star of that role. There are things no commercial would show as far as child rearing is concerned. Like waking up at 3am to make milk and the baby’s screaming his head off. No, it isn’t just for one night but for every night until the baby stops drinking milk from a bottle after 3-5 years. Changing diapers is also messy. Smelly and messy. But women cope because it’s their child but when a man is caught with a dirty diaper, he calls his wife because it’s a “woman’s job” regardless if she hasn’t slept in the past 18 hours.

Breast feeding also requires some orientation. Some women find it uncomfortable to breast feed. Some can’t even lactate due to some physical problem with the breasts. Of course, men can never fill this role so it is up to the women to perform. If you can’t breast feed, elderly people will tell you so many terrible things about the inability and what the baby is missing out on. To a point of saying you’re a lousy mother; these people won’t care what the problem is. If you’re capable of breast feeding, your breasts; voluptuous as it was before you gave birth only has one direction and that’s south. The breast line goes nearer and nearer your waist line and for what? Okay you’ve breast fed the baby. You have breast fed the baby for more than 6 months. People will say it is best if you do for 2 years! Doing this, you earn the favor of all the elderly people in his and your family. But when you’re alone and you look at yourself naked in the mirror, what do you see? Do you think you’ll like what you’ll see? Your nipples will be huge and swollen and the entire breast is beginning to sag. You think you’ll like seeing that? Do you think your husband will like seeing that as well? It is RARE that a man will take into consideration that his wife is breastfeeding his child and accepts the changes in her body. Most men don not have the brain cells to even accept it or be considerate enough and expect their wives to “take better care of physical attributes” to keep him interested.

Why should one not get married? Dealing with the reality of being married has no seminar or course in college. You have counselors but they usually show up after the wedding and after the marriage goes haywire. The Church calls marriage a sacred vow both parties have to fulfill in order to be favorable in the eyes of God. 8 out of 10 marriages are lousy and depressing. 6 out of 10 marriages end up in separation and people will always take sides and blame both parties. More often than not, men leave their wives because of someone else. Some one younger or more adventurous in bed. That is considered normal in our society because of the “macho” image of having more than one woman in a man’s life. But when a wife leaves her husband for one reason or another even if it isn’t because of another man, she is the most evil wife, the most immoral person and the one with all the faults. Did anyone bother to ask her why she left?

People and counselors only see the outside scenario. They can’t understand the situation because they are not the ones IN the situation. They might be able to relate to your problems but marital problems are on a case-to-case basis. There isn’t one exact replica of another problem. In general there are similarities but the details differ and levels of pain and abuse vary.

How does one deal with it when after the honeymoon, Dr. Jekyll returns to being Mr. Hyde? People react differently under different circumstances. He might be a saint living with his parents but the devil in disguise the minute you get your own place. You won’t know until it’s too late and the only solution is either getting a legal separation or annulment. This is where counselors and group therapy in some religious council come in. People will invite you to join their marriage counseling group and have some one “in the know” tell you that there’s something wrong with your marriage, as if you didn’t already know. They’ll give you lessons on how to bear the hardships and how to deal with the partner. They’ll tell you everything except tell you to leave him or her. I doubt it if they’ll say anything if one partner ends up dead in the bedroom or in the intensive care unit after being beaten up.

So you found a real jerk or bitch. The down side to all this is that you’re married to each other and there’s no divorce in this country. The legal separation is a lengthy and expensive process and it is mandatory that a couple undergo marriage counseling for 6 or more months to be monitored and given by a psychiatrist. If the shrink does not declare either party mentally incapacitated, then 6 months of counseling will not guarantee a separation but instead make it more impossible to be separated. An annulment takes even longer and is more expensive than getting a legal separation. So why should you get married in the first place?

There are no ideal marriages. People will always tell you that. No fairy tale, no Prince Charming, no happy endings. That’s the reality no one else will discuss with you until you realize for yourself that you’ve made one heck of a stupid mistake. And by that time, you’ll probably be intellectually backward to be gainfully employed, back ridden by half a dozen kids, no maids and too old for the job market. You might have a 36-40-45 body statistic and a husband you’d love to lose with the 40 pound excess weight you’ve gained in less than 10 years.

At this day and age, a woman should not be bothered by the fact that her age is leaping off the calendar and she is still single, no kids and no husband. That is bliss for most women who are still within the calendar’s number but look like they have their age written in the lotto ticket. Compare a working wife-mother to a mother/wife who stays home to take care of the kids, house and husband. Who is happier and more fulfilled as a person? Of course it will always be the working wife because she’s independent, she doesn’t need her husband’s financial help in some cases. She is socially active, socially aware, updated with the changing times and her level of self respect is higher than a house-bound wife. Some women find fulfillment in being full time mothers and wives. But the bottom line is – a woman has to be prepared for the unknown. She has to be ready for anything and to better arm herself with whatever comes – working a job is better than working at the home no matter what elders say. What if he leaves you and you’re not working? To get a legal guarantee you and the children will get support the minute he steps out of the door is a long shot. I know a lot of separated women who work and take care of their kids with no decent support from their husbands or totally nothing. Yet these men expect to get visitation rights the minute they don’t have a girlfriend waiting for them. The way I see it, if they want to see their children, they should pay for it. If they don’t want to get legal summons from court, they should send decent support. But the law in this country lacks implementation and monitoring. Filing one document in family court is expensive and most mothers would rather use that money to buy food than spend it on blood-sucking lawyers.

House bound wives are often mistaken as those who have nothing to do since all they do is stay home. That all they attend to is gossip with the neighbors or watch gossip shows and drama series on television. When the 15^th or 30^th comes, they demand for their husband’s salaries. That is the typical Filipino mentality for house wives. What most people are not aware of is the fact that a full time mother/wife is a 24 hour job description with no overtime pay, no vacation leaves and no salary adjustments. The only salary they get is whatever’s left of the budget once everything is paid for. Being a full time mother/wife means being at the beck and call of everyone in the house. It’s better if she has a maid but most men who have non-working wives at home prefer that they not get a maid especially if it’s a small family at that.

Full-time mothers/wives do everything in the house from scrubbing the toilet grime to doing the laundry, throwing out the garbage, cooking, cleaning, and picking up after everyone, doing the dishes and ironing the clothes. She is mother, wife, cleaning lady, cook, garbage woman, laundry woman, carpenter, mechanic, electrician, and tutor and bed partner. To hell if she’s been working from sun up to sun down. The minute her husband makes her lie down and spread her legs, she has no choice but give in. That’s what being a full time mother/wife really is. That’s a major part of any marriage in this country or any country for that matter.

The Church will also tell you that the first and real purpose of marriage is to have kids. (As if there weren’t enough orphans in the world.) So if you’re getting married because you’re pregnant, then that’s that. But if you’re not pregnant, ask yourself if you want kids or if you’re ready to have kids. You have to ask yourself how you feel about children. How? Find a relative or friend with a three year old child and take over as surrogate mother for one day to one week. If you survive one week, you might make it as a mother. But if the week made you feel it was hard and bothersome on both your physical and mental state; don’t feel so bad because most mothers feel the same way you do. The only difference is – you can give up being a surrogate mother and real mothers can’t. They are stuck for life and they are stuck with that reality day in and day out until their kids are old enough to leave the nest.

In reality, if you don’t have a maid and you have a child; you work 388 days a year, 30 hours a day and 9 days a week. Gone are the days when a nursemaid would stay up with you or stay up voluntarily with a child. Today’s maids choose their job description and have the nerve to choose the kind of work they will do and will not do. You also put your child at risk with the possibility that they’ll get neglected, abused or sold when you’re not around. So you end up getting tied not only to the house, but also to the child. And when your husband comes home and starts demanding for attention and sex, would you say no? At the risk of getting replaced or beaten up? The first choice is always NOT to get married.

The “package deal” is also a lot of bull. If you do not learn to put a line between your roles as mother, wife, daughter, and daughter in law, career woman, friend, and partner – the roles get mixed up and you get messed up. You won’t even have time enough for yourself to hear yourself think. But being single doesn’t require such role descriptions because your only role is to yourself. You don’t answer to anyone except yourself and your sole responsibility is yourself. Too selfish? Why? Do you think anyone else is going to look out for you whether you’re married or not? You think your husband will look out for you and take care of you when you need him the most? You’re lucky if you find that one man in a thousand. The minute a man comes home and there’s no food on the table, when he can’t have his way with you and starts treating you no less than the maid, he will look out for you because he’ll be scared to live alone and do every chore by himself. The minute you cannot perform your duties and his house becomes “messy” by his standards, all that mushy crap you felt before you got married is out the door and down the drain. He will manhandle you or leave you to find someone who’ll treat him like a king and that’s the truth.

So why bother getting married? If you’re not a masochist, why get married? If you love your freedom, why get married? If you love your job, why give it up for someone who can’t offer you a job but be his slave for the next ten years or until you die of old age at 39? If you want to be young at an old age, don’t get married. It’s better than getting old at a young age.