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I've know really brilliant women who have ruined their careers, etc., based on their husbands giving them really bad advice, that they knew was bad advice, and then do things they never would have done if they hadn't felt the need to keep their husband happy.
I started out with a really long example, but decided I'd just start the discussion without complicated details.
I currently have a friend who has followed her husband's advice while he has sabotaged her career. I believe it's because he's afraid she'll leave him.
Do you have experience or opinions on why this happens? I just would never let it happen, and have always stood up to what I considered to be bad advice. I'd rather be alone than deal with crazy drama. So, I just don't get it. Especially, when there's plenty of money in income and equity, etc., so divorce wouldn't leave them destitute.
Last edited by NoMoreSnowForMe; 10-09-2019 at 08:39 PM..
So, I just don't get it. Especially, when there's plenty of money in income and equity, etc., so divorce wouldn't leave them destitute.
Choosing to stay in a relationship, choosing to be dependent, choosing to cave in to or accept someone else's "leadership" isn't about money and probably isn't about smarts either.
It’s easy to have perspective from the outside looking in. When you are knee deep in your relationship, it is a challenge to look at what is happening around you objectively.
I currently have a friend who has followed her husband's advice while he has sabotaged her career. I believe it's because he's afraid she'll leave him.
Do you have experience or opinions on why this happens? I just would never let it happen, and have always stood up to what I considered to be bad advice. I'd rather be alone than deal with crazy drama. So, I just don't get it. Especially, when there's plenty of money in income and equity, etc., so divorce wouldn't leave them destitute.
Those are harsh words. One reason why I do not discuss money with anyone but SO. On the other hand this is third party information aka gossip.
I had an assistant for ten years. She was absolutely wonderful. Hard-working, conscientious, funny, creative, and had an amazing attitude. We became very good friends in our professional life. She passed away several years ago and I still miss her. She just made work fun.
In our many conversations, we typically avoided discussing our marriages. That's just a boundary you just don't cross. But one time, we had a long eight-hour drive to a client meeting and got to talking. She asked how my wife and I did things in terms of decision making.
Since my wife is a CPA and the CFO of a largish real estate company, the money is pretty much her domain. I don't abdicate my right to chime in, but she knows her stuff. When Kellie heard this, she said, "Oh, wow. That wouldn't fly with Keith."
What? As it turns out, her fundamentalist husband believed strongly in a husband-led marriage, as in making all the decisions. While that might have been the norm in 1st Century Palestine, it's a stupid concept in 21st Century America. I mean, the Bible accepted the reality of slavery back then, too. Does that mean it's acceptable today as well?
So during this long car ride, she started unloading on me. For example, when their first child was born, they lived close to town near their jobs. But her mother-in-law offered to take care of the baby if they'd move close to her. No discussion, no nothing. The next thing Kellie knows, Keith is putting their home up for sale and moving them down the street from his family out in the sticks. So whereas Kellie previously had a five-minute to work, it was now an hour-long slog.
Three weeks after they move home, the MIL reneges on the arrangement, saying she just couldn't handle childcare duties any longer. Yet Keith refused to move back into town. So Kellie spent the next 18 years driving an hour to work and back, almost until the day she died. This town was so backwards that it didn't even have a coffee shop, so she would always stop off at Starbucks before getting into the office. To you and me, Starbucks is kind of meh. To her, it was the very emblem of luxury that was unavailable to her where she lived.
One of our clients was the local symphony. For one performance, we got four free tickets. Kellie had never been to the symphony, so we all went together. It was a great performance and Kellie was dazzled by it. In the party after the performance, there were waiters passing out champagne flutes. My wife had one, I had one, and Kellie decided to have one. Keith just about had a fit in the middle of the party. Whenever we traveled on business, I would typically have a martini or a glass of wine at dinner. Meanwhile, Kellie would say, "I'd like to try that, but I have to answer to my husband."
She earned a good salary, but her husband gave her an allowance. We went to a trade show in Las Vegas, and he forbid her to spend time in a casino, even dictating what shows she could attend at night after our work was done. As in he would look at the shows we were considering online and tell her which ones he thought appropriate.
He also suspected that we were having an affair (We weren't. Not even a hint), to the point that Kellie woke up in the middle of the night caught him going through her e-mails and text messages to me. Of course, he found nothing, because there was nothing going on between us. But it practically took an act of Congress for her to go on business trips to, you know, do her job. In addition to Las Vegas, we went on something like a dozen business trips together. Every single time, she needed Keith's okay.
I mean, one time we were heading back to the office after a client appointment. It was nearly Christmas, and I needed to stop by my church to pick up something. Being an Episcopalian, we have decidedly different views than the Fundamentalists on a host of things. So we walk into the church offices to pick up a package and happen to encounter our female priest. While I excused myself to go to the restroom, Kellie and Danielle had a nice discussion. Then she asked if she could see the inside of the sanctuary. It's a beautiful, graceful worship space with stained glass windows. She wandered through there and just admired the place.
So when she excitedly recounted the visit to Keith, he evidently hit the roof that she even crossed the threshold of the place. So the next time I had to run an errand at my church, she waited in the car.
And this was for an educated woman who, in every other aspect of her life was a strong-willed person. But when it came to her husband's word, she the demeanor of a whipped dog. I don't think he was physically abusive, but he sure had her under his thumb.
When she died, my wife and I went to the funeral in some backwoods church. What we experienced was less of a funeral and more of a long and sustained meditation on hell and damnation for those people who didn't shape up and go to church. Mind you, I'm a professing Christian who fully subscribes to the Nicene Creed, but this was so far removed from the humane and kind stripe of Christianity I follow that I wondered if we were actually using the same Bible.
After the funeral, my wife said, "Well, I was all prepared to weep buckets at Kellie's funeral. Now I'm just mad."
Last edited by MinivanDriver; 10-10-2019 at 09:35 AM..
I've know really brilliant women who have ruined their careers, etc., based on their husbands giving them really bad advice, that they knew was bad advice, and then do things they never would have done if they hadn't felt the need to keep their husband happy.
I started out with a really long example, but decided I'd just start the discussion without complicated details.
I currently have a friend who has followed her husband's advice while he has sabotaged her career. I believe it's because he's afraid she'll leave him.
Do you have experience or opinions on why this happens? I just would never let it happen, and have always stood up to what I considered to be bad advice. I'd rather be alone than deal with crazy drama. So, I just don't get it. Especially, when there's plenty of money in income and equity, etc., so divorce wouldn't leave them destitute.
Common sense is rarely a perfect mate to a person's iq level. One can be without the other.
For some healthy marriages ...they balance some of their strengths and weaknesses. A partner may be better at cooking or fixing items. And may actually enjoy it!
Integrating is key though. Awareness .
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