It seems odd to write this post today as it would have been my 22nd anniversary. Years where I'm feeling particularly snarky I will text my ex and tell him "Happy Anniversary!" This has not happened since I met my current husband. Nor do I feel the loss I once felt every time this date rolled around.
As stated, 22 years ago I entered the life of a Mormon housewife. This was not completely willing on my part. Being we already had an infant, I felt very pushed by 'his' family and 'him' to get married ASAP. Just minutes before I was to be married my mom offered me the car keys and said I could leave and she wouldn't care that they were out the cost. I nearly took her up on it. Only my kids remind me of the blessings that came from the marriage. I hesitated to say yes during the ceremony. Somehow I knew my life was not going to be the fairy-tale I'd always dreamed to would be.
Married at 19 wasn't exactly what I had wanted. Nor already being a mom. 'He' is the reason I did not give up my oldest. I didn't want 'him' to raise her. My oldest sister and her husband had approached me to adopt my baby and I felt that it was what needed to be done. 'He' asserted his priesthood authority and stated that as the priesthood holder he knew we HAD to get married and raise the baby as a family. So getting married was my second choice. Yes, my daughter is well aware of all this. We've spoken about it many times. She knows that I love her and just wish I could have done better by her, but I will never regret her in my life.
A couple weeks after marriage we moved into our first apartment. Shortly thereafter we had the bishopric and relief society presidency visit us. The look of shock on their faces when they found out we had just gotten married made me feel ashamed. We vowed to attend church on a regular basis. My grandma-in-law was in our ward. A sweet, little Danish woman who taught me the meaning of unconditional love. She didn't always understand why people acted the way they did, but she loved nonetheless.
Shortly after we began attending our ward (newlyweds or nearly deads because of the ages of most ward members) I was called to teach in Primary. Last time I had been in Primary I was a Merry Miss B (11yo). I had absolutely no clue what I was doing and I had one child in my class. I was quickly clumped together with all the other newlywed women and young moms. I was utterly lost yet treated as if I should have it altogether.
Then came homemaking nights. Talk about a night designed to make a young wife and mother feel like a failure. I had a pretty organized home, but was quickly becoming depressed. I couldn't measure up to these people. There was no way I could do everything they seemed to expect me to do. I just was not hardwired to pander to a man. When I asked an older woman what she would do if her husband just dumped his stuff throughout the house after coming home from work I was met with a bewildered look. She said a good wife picks up the mess and keeps the home tidy. So I asked a few more women and was told the same thing. Then I asked my married sisters. They said to pick it up but put it in a box and at the end of the week tell him to take care of it or you'd through his crap out. That didn't go over well at all and led to a late night physical confrontation which left me bruised and scared. I knew I needed to do what he said or I'd be hurt. Funny thing is, there was only one physical altercation after this in which I stood up to him and they never happened again. I guess me threatening him with my older brothers was a good thing.
My dinners always seemed to have something wrong with them. I'd try to include him in menu planning to which he'd tell me what ever I fixed he'd be happy with. Yet he never really was. I was constantly hearing about how I could make a dish taste good next time I fixed it. Truly disheartening.
Then I had a meeting with the bishop...PPI (aka personal priesthood interview)...something I'd never truly participated in before. When I spoke of some of my frustrations with marriage I was told it was my 'wifely duty' to attend to my husband in every area. It was not his job to help with housework or child-rearing unless I was in the hospital having just given birth to a new child. I was devastated to learn that I had to completely give up me to cater to him.
It was during this time that I was also dealing with a mother-in-law who hated me. She felt I had 'ruined' her precious son by getting pregnant and preventing him from serving a mission. Like it doesn't take two to tango. But she also expected me to take care of her son in the way she took care of her husband. By catering and giving in to him.
Then the flu hit our household. Thankfully the baby really didn't get sick. The husband did and he was difficult to deal with during it. Just as he got better I became sick. He was upset that I wasn't fixing dinner for him or getting up to prepare his breakfast in the morning. I felt like death. One morning I did get up early enough to take him to work and drove myself and our daughter to my parents house. I was supposed to be working on laundry. My mom took one look at me and told me I needed to be seen by a doctor. She worked on my laundry and took care of my daughter while I went to the doctor. I had a severe sinus infection and strep throat. When I returned to my mom's she called my husband and let him know he'd need to find a way to their house to take me and the baby home. She also told him how sick I was. That night, once we got home, I was told how humiliating it was to have my mom call him and tell him how to take care of me. He said he had plans that night and I'd have to figure it out myself. So I did...all to keep the peace...and in being the good Mormon housewife I was being told by the church to be. I was down for nearly a week with something that I could've been over with much quicker if I'd been "allowed" to rest like was needed.
I realize that I must sound bitter. I'm really not. It's just the experience. It taught me a lot, in retrospect, for the time in which I became a single mom. When no one was there to really help out yet things had to be done.
This all took place in just the first 6 months of marriage. I knew I had entered the 7th level of hell...and was too scared to run the other direction for fear of punishment from my bishop. I definitely had, in that short amount of time, developed a fear of the patriarchy and this was to set me on a very dangerous course for the next 10 years.
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