Partnership and Independence, Part 2

Partnership and Independence, Part 2

June 14th, 2010 @ 3:03 pm by Mrs. Taco
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I’ve been thinking a lot about Mrs. Penguin’s recent post on life lessons reinforced at an early age: never depend on your partner to live. Always be able to pay your own way. There are exceptions, sure, including school for one, or layoffs for another.

But the post got me thinking about partnership and independence. Namely, that being married or being parents are easy scapegoats on which we blame our own shortcomings or bad decisions. I’ve done it plenty of times. You have too, I’m sure. But I’m really trying not to, because I’ve seen it go mega-wrong in some cases, in marriages ranging from zero years old to 30 years old.

For example:

“He made me be a stay-at-home mom, now I don’t have any skills to re-enter the workforce.”

Some exclusively stay-at-home moms relish their role, becoming masters of the domestic, budgeting, and child-rearing domain. Professional life ended a couple years ago, but it may come again in the future. Still, others are not OK with this and feel like it was thrust upon them unfairly.

No one, except maybe the cops, the IRS, and your employer, makes you do anything. If your skills are important to you, they should remain priorities. And if he understands how important they are to you, he should encourage that, IMHO. If they are no longer priorities, then so be it, but you can’t blame your spouse for an arrangement you approved.

“We only stayed together for the kids.”

As someone with no personal experience with divorce, I can’t weigh in with a first-person perspective. But is it better to stay together and be miserable rather than chart a new path where everyone wins? It’s crappy and complicated, I’m sure. But I think kids still end up on the shit end whenever this statement it said: whether it’s now, in their formative years, or in several years, when poor communication and resentment had time to stew and worsen.

“She neglected me, so I was forced to cheat with someone who didn’t.”

Speaking of poor communication. I think the onus is always on the cheater, regardless of what cheatee did wrong. This is complicated if both people cheated, so let’s not go down that road for now. Nonetheless, “I met someone new” should not be the first time you discuss relationship problems, but that often seems to be the case.

What are the keys to being a good partner while also being independent? Not depending on your spouse to live and not turning him or her into your scapegoat seem like good places to start, to me. But where’s your balance?

Tags: relationships, san-francisco |

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5 Responses to “Partnership and Independence, Part 2”

Member

Goldilocks1107 (message) 2,504 posts, Sugar bee

Learning how to kill spiders on my own without freaking out (I had to kill 2 this past week when FH was out of town).
And not taking each other for granted - we try to thank and tell each other we appreciate them, whether it’s assembling invitations or taking out the garbage.

6/14/10 @ 4:11 pm (reply)

Member

scournoyer418 (message) 138 posts, Blushing bee

I think realizing the issues - like one person making more money, one person doing most of the chores etc - may make someone bitter. We are not married yet but I still try to be mindful of some of the things that will bother my FI and talk about it.
I also like goldilocks idea about appreciating - i tell my FI OFTEN how much I appreciate him. Things like dish doing or laundry doing doesn’t seem so bad to him when I tell him how much I appreciate it.

6/14/10 @ 4:17 pm (reply)

Bee

Miss Cardigan (message) 8,645 posts, Bee Keeper

Definitely a thought provoking post! I think when you’re trying to maintain independence in a relationship, it’s really important to have your own hobbies and activities that you enjoy separate from one another. I’ve known way too many couples who can’t stand to be apart from one another, and it always seems to be an unhealthy relationship - it’s good to maintain some of who you were before you got together!

6/14/10 @ 4:18 pm (reply)

Bee

Mrs. Hamster (message) 4,046 posts, Honey bee

Great post! For us, maintaining a sense of independence/different groups of friends is definitely key.

6/14/10 @ 4:31 pm (reply)

Member

Miss Peace (message) 648 posts, Busy bee

Everyone needs their own interests and hobbies. What is important is that your spouse never gets bored of experiencing them with you and vise versa. There should be a sense of independence in every relationship- but at the same the that other person should always ‘want’ to be a part of things you love or people you love. It definitely takes a lot of work, but I have watched my own parents go through the ups and downs of marriage and I really believe I learned a lot from it. Great post!

6/15/10 @ 9:44 am (reply)