What Do Women Gain From Marriage?

Mojisola

unholyangel wrote: »

Hopefully those of us with kids will not be confining them to the same fate and will be encouraging sons to do the washing up/dusting and encouraging daughters to learn how to wire a plug etc.

This is what my parents did back in the 1950s - all of us were taught to cook, clean, decorate, do diy, garden, car maintenance, basic sewing and clothes repairs, etc.

If you spend any time in your life living alone, you need to know how to do everything, not just "women's" or "men's" jobs.

unholyangel

Mojisola wrote: »

This is what my parents did back in the 1950s - all of us were taught to cook, clean, decorate, do diy, garden, car maintenance, basic sewing and clothes repairs, etc.

If you spend any time in your life living alone, you need to know how to do everything, not just "women's" or "men's" jobs.

I was the same (although not in the 50's! Kudos to your parents, very forward thinking of them!). Learned some things from mum, some from dad and some from both (mums mashed potato is crap compared to dads! )

DFlights

With regards to pensions - people here seem to think that most of us will have multiple pensions, savings, etc by the time we're over forty.

I haven't one. Not a single pension. Neither has OH. Unfortunately, this has come about through being forced to take on rubbish NMW jobs (nothing else available) and various problems that have required use of our savings, so we've been left with next to nothing. Therefore, unless one of us suddenly comes into money, there'll be so little to fight for if one of us dies, that it's not worth anything more than a basic will. I suppose living hand-to-mouth for years has at least one benefit then!

I'd like to know if there's some way to completely exclude my blood relatives from having anything to do with my life or funeral should the worst happen. need to check my will about that, but can they challenge it?

AngelOfTheNorth

Funerals are usually public events, aren't they, so I'm not sure you can legally exclude anyone. But if you hate your blood family and you want to try and ensure they have as little say over your life as possible, what you want is for your partner to be your cast iron next of kin. Marriage would be the best way to do that. The worst case scenario is them being able to exclude your partner from important decisions if your health goes downhill. I would actually say that marriage is particularly beneficial for someone whose priority is their partner overriding their blood family. There are other ways to do this, like next of kin agreements and power of attorney, but marriage is the most simple, widely understood and watertight.

FBaby

Many women like (and prefer) to stay at home and look after the home and kids while their husband goes out to work and brings the money in too. Some may want to work part time, but I have yet to meet a woman who wants to have the responsibility of being the breadwinner, while her husband stays home and looks after the home and kids.

Well that is until divorce, then suddenly it becomes a case of having sacrificed the career she cherished so much for the sole benefit of supporting her husband aspiration, hence fighting for maximum settlement as compensation.

74jax

I gained an awful lot of security, although we'd been together 8 years when we got married, I feel much more secure now - also living together helps :-) I didn't want to live together beforehand so that in itself was huge for us.

Mojisola

Peter333 wrote: »

Many women like (and prefer) to stay at home and look after the home and kids while their husband goes out to work and brings the money in too. Some may want to work part time, but I have yet to meet a woman who wants to have the responsibility of being the breadwinner, while her husband stays home and looks after the home and kids.

Maybe there are some women like this, but I have never met any.

I have - and the majority of the others I know don't want to give up their financial independence just because they have children.

We live a long way past child-rearing years and having a career (rather than a pin-money job) is important to many women.

DFlights

I still wouldn't want to be married - if we ever split up, divorce always seems to be fraught with nastiness.

It's a shame that there's little way of making the blood relatives exempt from any decisions without marrying, as neither of us are keen on being married. And yes, y family have been that nasty that I don't want them to have any say in my affairs - what would people's response be if I were single? Go and marry someone to get security from all this? No, there has to be another way.

maman

Peter333 wrote: »

Exactly. Many women are happy to take on the traditional women's tasks and have the men take over the traditional men's tasks.

Many women like (and prefer) to stay at home and look after the home and kids while their husband goes out to work and brings the money in too. Some may want to work part time, but I have yet to meet a woman who wants to have the responsibility of being the breadwinner, while her husband stays home and looks after the home and kids.

Maybe there are some women like this, but I have never met any.

I don't think some women like to admit or acknowledge it, but many women do not want to take on the traditional man's role of being the main or sole breadwinner, and are happier to stick to traditional 'roles.'

And as you said Mojisola, as long as both parties are happy with it, who are we to judge?

I know people like that and you're right they rarely acknowledge it just enjoy a 'yummy mummy' lifestyle, which their poor OH funds. I find such women very, very difficult to understand.


As far as I'm concerned I had an excellent education, as good as any of my male contemporaries, and to waste it sitting around in coffee shops is something I just can't fathom. Aside from the career fulfilment, I'd hate not to have money of my own that I'd earned.


As for domestic chores, my DH is from a large family and 4 eldest are all boys, so my MIL brought them all up to be able to do domestic things and help her with the younger ones. DH and I share things more or less 50:50.

Mojisola

DFlights wrote: »

I still wouldn't want to be married - if we ever split up, divorce always seems to be fraught with nastiness.

The unpleasantness happens because a couple can't agree how to divide things up - that needs to be done whether they were married or not.

It's not the 'divorce' that makes things nasty - it's the approach the couple take to separating.