Ayelet Waldman wrote A VERY CONTROVERSIAL ESSAY last year in which she admitted that she loves her husband more than she loves her children.
I'm with her in the first half of the piece - about remaining romantically connected to the spouse after having a baby. I, too, was an (apparent) rarity among new mothers as someone who never stopped feeling, ahem, amorous toward the father of my children at any time.
But she loses me near the middle when she starts talking about how she could live without her children, but not without her husband.
Your thoughts on the essay?
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I don't want to sell anything, buy anything, or process anything as a career. I don't want to sell anything bought or processed, or buy anything sold or processed, or process anything sold, bought, or processed, or repair anything sold, bought, or processed. You know, as a career, I don't want to do that.
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18 comments:
I wonder why she chooses to quantify love in this way. It does strike me as odd, the way she wrote it, though it is mostly perhaps her response to feeling "otherized" by the mothering community. But why not emphasize "I love my husband differently" instead of "I love my husband more"?
The ideal for marriage is that your spouse is first and foremost and all other relationships are second. That doesn't mean you don't put the kids or someone else (your parents, your best friend, your sister) first at times, just that the primary relationship in your life is the partner. That why your vows, if you get married in a church, say 'keeping yourself only unto her.' That doesn't just mean you don't have sex with anyone else. It means there is a piece of this relationship that must be kept sacred, to yourselves, and it is the number one relationship.
That's also why, if you are a Christian, the marriage ideal is 'a man leaves his father and mother and cleaves to his wife, and the two become one flesh.'
I think parents who get too involved in the kids to the detriment of the marriage get in trouble. In the long run, it lessens their effectiveness as parents.
When I first read this piece--which IIRC she also wrote that she wanted to include a line about how she would throw one of her children in front of a bullet to save her husband's life--I was quite honestly shaking with anger.
Ayelet is a talented writer, but I cannot identify with her experience of being obssed with her husband or loving him more then her kids. Her tone of smug superiority,the suggestion that her husband is Perfect Man, their sex life is likewise, and those playgroup moms are such sad, pathetic creatures really annoys me.
It also annoys my husband. We both agree that if faced with the terrible decision to save your spouse or your child, our child would win, every time.
It also would have been nice if Ayelet had considered the many, many physical/emotional/relationship/societal reasons why women have a low sex drive postpartum. But she was too busy being smug, buying new vibrators and looking down on other women.
One additional thought I forgot to include, is that at least one of her children is old enough to find this essay now. There is quite a difference between expaining to a 30 year-old that she or he does not come first, and doing the same with a young child, who likely thinks his or her mother is the best thing in the world.
Really she could have expressed the idea that her marriage is important in a more constructive way, even if she would have missed out on a truckload of publicity.
One additional thought I forgot to include, is that at least one of her children is old enough to find this essay now. There is quite a difference between expaining to a 30 year-old that she or he does not come first, and doing the same with a young child, who likely thinks his or her mother is the best thing in the world.
Really she could have expressed the idea that her marriage is important in a more constructive way, even if she would have missed out on a truckload of publicity.
I've had this debate with a friend who is wife and "other mother" about her marriage- I'm twice divorced and not a mom , so I have no dog in this hunt. But her explaination of this, from biblical teachings gave me a bit of understanding- that your spouse is part of you. You may have other children but could not replace spouse in church's view. This was long before the current buzz about this article and I agree she comes across in a very negative way
Once you have been through a divorce, especially one you didn't want, the idea that you "can't replace your spouse" becomes sort of offensive...
A little gossip mongering...
I cannot remember where I read this NY gossip about her.
That she is obsessed with her husband in an unhealthy way: and it is not for biblical reasons she puts him first! She is obsessed enough to have pursued him like a mad crazy women when he was still married to another women until she got him.
Since he was a man easily won over by an extramarital affair her world will crash when he leaves her for his next crazy affair.
I am like Katie, I am with her until the middle when whe begins her offensive description of loving her husband more than her children. She is a wack-job if I've ever seen one. And I agree with Karrie's comments that she seems rather smug about herself. It seems she is devoting too much time to visiting the sex-toy store and not enough time building a relationship with her child. Why does she infer that she is the only women in the world who still enjoys time with her spouse? However,I would push my husband into a fire anyday to save my child, that is if I couldn't jump into it first. And I don't agree that it is Biblical to love your spouse more than your child.I do not for a moment think there is only one person for me; what if that person dies? Should I be lonely all the rest of my days? But I am really sorry for these children. Children are so intuitive they must have figured out how their mother feels. It is a crime!
I remember reading that essay. My main thought was honestly that I felt sorry for Ayelet -- because most parents, these days, are outlived by their children. But most women, these days, outlive their husbands.
Some of what she says resonates with me and some of it does not. I would save my children before my husband, but it's not because I love them more; it's because they are my children and it is my job to protect them from danger. I would expect my husband to do the same if came to a choice between the children and me.
But my children are not the center of my universe to the exclusion of my husband. I don't think that's healthy. My children are one part of my life and my husband another, and they are both important, vital parts. If one of my children died I would be devastated; if my husband died I would be devastated. I think her mistake is thinking that love can be quantified and compared in this way--or that it needs to be.
Leslie I think you hit upon some valid points that I overlooked. It is not and either/or thing, this love for children and spouse. It is an entirely different kind of love we have for our children.I'm not sure why the writer thinks she has to choose. Am I the only one who thinks she feels this way?
This is rather illustrative of why I gave up on writing as a career. To be published, you need a 'take-away': some lesson, or something to think about. you need to take a side. you have to simplify life for your readers. And that's absurd.
sometimes I think writing is actually the opposite of a creative pursuit: it's a reductive pursuit. It takes real things out of the world, and so far as you want your options reduced or simplified, it's useful, but if you actually believe what you write, it can reduce your happiness and usefulness in life, and that might have happened here.
For what it's worth I don't like her writing or Michael Chabon's either. (that's her husband, right?)
I also don't like my writing. Too many commas. I want to say it all in one sentence.
Anyway, hi, Katie.
a bit narcisistic, a lot disingenuous, all that stuff about "oh, i'm such a bad mom, something must be wrong with me." obviously, she doesn't think that at all.
i'll own up that one of my first reactions (right along side revulsion -- what kind of mother wouldn't put her children first over anyone in the world, including herself?) was a bit of jealousy. that sort of passion sounds so -- i don't know ... exotic, wild, intense... reading about her relationship with her husband puts me in mind of all sorts of things that i might have liked to do with my life but didn't -- like be a big dyke around town in new york city, smoking cigarettes and wearing dock martens and being really edgy and having lots of sex with lots of chicks. or traveling around the world and serving in the peace corp in africa and learning lots of languages and ending up a cool ex-pat in berlin. or or or... but to be honest, i think for me personally, that sort of relationship would lose its allure pretty fast, and after a while i would just be worn out. i'm a home body at heart, stirred by more quotidian mysteries. in the end i'm willing to bet that my somewhat boring and predictable relationship is every bit as deep, the water from its well every bit as cool and refreshing, as ayelet's. so bully for her, but hold the pity, thanks very much.
katie - I didn't mean to offend. Just a comment that the idea of marriage and spouses being equally yoked (another biblical concept) would mean honor in marriage and you wouldn't be divorced....It's the ideal of marriage, I couldn't manage it but I still see the concept.
the oldroadhog wrote:
"For what it's worth I don't like her writing or Michael Chabon's either. (that's her husband, right?)"
Yes it is! They deserve each other.
Let's not get started on her husband!
He gave a lecture and talked about a fake Holocaust memoir The Book of Hell. The book and the story he told turned out to be a hoax and he was lying.
He is a piece of work!
He is not loved in the Jewish community. He has also claimed he left his first wife a “Goy” to marry a real a Jew to have Jewish children.
I agree with Britney. This woman has a superfical understanding of love. I think she is a good writer who is a bit lacking in the emotional intelligence department.
becky
I like what mamamarta said: "Obviously she doesn't think that at all".
Imagine if a man had written this piece: "Most men think the sexy part of the marriage is all over after the kids come. Not mine! While most guys get into the fathering, I pretty much leave that to my wife: she's a better mother. I just think the sex is the most important part of the relationship, and if that means my kids think they're just a by-product of that, well, welcome to reality!
God, my wife is a great piece of ass. I mean, isn't she hot? I feel sorry for every one else I meet."
I don't know, you think I could stretch it out a little and publish it somewhere?
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