He who has the gold makes the rules.

–Anonymous (who was she?)

You cannot choose to be financially dependent on a man and also call yourself a feminist.

The past decade has been a hotbed of debating the merits of the stay-at-home mom, how to achieve work-life balance and create workplaces that embrace family. The most recent brouhaha was New York magazine’s article The Retro Wife: Feminists who say they’re having it all — by choosing to stay at home. Writes the author:

American women are better educated than they’ve ever been, better educated now than men, but they get distracted during their prime earning years by the urge to procreate. As they mature, they earn less than men and are granted fewer responsibilities at work. Fifty years after the publication of The Feminine Mystique, women represent only a tiny fraction of corporate and government leaders, and they still earn only 77 cents on the male dollar.

I personally have experienced both sides of this equation: I’ve always identified as a feminist, and always been driven to succeed professionally. For the short time I was a married mom, I scaled back my work to very parttime and was with my daughter and caring for our home the rest of the time. I was stunned to find that I possess the stereotypical female urge to nurture the home and devote the best parts of myself to my family. I still cherish memories of my long — if exhausting — days spent with my newborn daughter, delighting even in changing poopy pants, babyfood making and cooking my husband dinner every night. But as I’ve written here, I am so grateful that I did not abandon my career completely. What this New York article does not explore, and the SAHM arguments rarely address, are the real and scary financial vulnerabilities involved with the decision to be a SAHM.

Feminism aims to empower women. Money is always power. That is why economic equality for the sexes has always been at the center of feminist initiatives. By definition, financial independence is at the core of feminism. When you chose to toss away your career, you put your whole family in financial jeopardy, and you rob yourself of your full potential by becoming dependent on a man. By choice. It is impossible to call yourself a feminist and consciously hand over your financial power to another person.

Each and every tenet of the feminist revolution can be boiled down to aim of  financial independence for women:

The vote: If women can’t vote for laws that protect their financial interests, women remain chattel in marriage and society.

Equal access to education: We’re not talking finishing school! Women have fought for Title 9 and access to all levels of primary and higher education so you can gain the skills necessary to have a career, earn money, support yourself and be empowered to make choices on your own behalf.

Equal pay for equal work: Duh.

Sexual assault and domestic violence legal reform: If you do not have your own money it is very hard to muster the confidence to report crime, finance the exit an abusive relationship, or be a plaintiff in a legal case.

Family law reform: No fault divorce set the ball rolling to ensure that the lesser-earning spouse (a.k.a. the wife) is financially protected, and children are financially provided for.

Abortion: Granting women power over their reproductive choices gives them financial power since they are not forced to provide for unwanted children.

Let’s quickly address anomalous scenarios that would be immune from this rule: Women who live in oppressive communities (developing countries, mainly), medical conditions which render an adult woman dependent on male relatives, and of course gay women, to whom I say you cannot be dependent on a female partner and also be a feminist. (If you are a lesbian and not a feminist, please email me stat because I want to interview your freaky ass.)

Each day I try to give thanks for the feminists that came before me: Suffragists who understood that voting power equals financial power equals gender equality. Second-wave feminists in the 60s and 70s who paved the way for my assumption that a) I would go to college, and b) I could do any career I wanted and be expected to be paid as much as my male colleagues.

In this exercise I find myself being thankful for things in my life that I had no control over — mainly that a family tragedy and ensuing divorce forced me to return to fulltime work and be financially responsible for my family. It is only now in this role as financial provider and mother that I have found all the fruits of the activism and work of my feminist foremothers. It is only now that I am realizing my creative, professional and financial potential.  Looking back, I see how the fact that I earned less in my career created a subtle power shift in my relationship — my husband earned more, and so his career was a priority. With this, it meant that he should invest more time and financial resources in building that career. It also meant that our life plans — relocating, investments, home purchases — hinged on that career.

My earning power and career were secondary. By default, I became secondary in some regards.

My life today is an expression of the benefits of a formal education, equal access to professional opportunity and pay. My children and I are protected by divorce laws that made that transition of our lives easier, and I enjoy the safety and freedom to live as a sexual woman for whom the law affords me protections and choices.

It is only now that my am truly proud that my children can be raised by a person who is living the fullest, richest version of herself — which is exactly what feminism set out to help me do.

Are you following my 10-year marriage contract project? Ryan Seacrest, Woman’s Day, CafeMom and Huffington Post are all over it:

• A 10-year contract will save marriage
• Marriage is dead
• One spouse is not enough
• Let’s stop celebrating wedding anniversaries
• What if your failed marriage was really a success?

Related articles

• I’m a Feminist (lupinpuppy.wordpress.com)
• Why Feminism is Still Needed (youthpolitcal.wordpress.com)
• Why Women’s Issues Should Be Exposed to Young People (jamieswanton.wordpress.com)
• I Was Born A Feminist (elizabethahawksworth.com)
• I’ve got news for you…you’re a feminist. (feministsatlarge.wordpress.com)
• The tragic irony of feminists trashing each other | Jill Filipovic (guardian.co.uk)
• The great feminist revival (guardian.co.uk)
• Wmst 101 (womancipation.wordpress.com)
• Men and Feminism (bellejarblog.wordpress.com)
• The Sandwich Myths (literatypakistanblogs.wordpress.com)

The post You cannot be a feminist and choose to be financially dependent on a man appeared first on Wealthy Single Mommy.

Are you following my 10-year marriage contract project? Ryan Seacrest, Woman’s Day, CafeMom and Huffington Post are all over it:

• A 10-year contract will save marriage
• Marriage is dead
• One spouse is not enough
• Let’s stop celebrating wedding anniversaries
• What if your failed marriage was really a success?

The post Don’t be a crazy mom who nurtures her kids 24/7 appeared first on Wealthy Single Mommy.

My best SMILF Morghan and I discussed buying a multifamily home together, and reaping the financial, logistical and emotional benefits afforded married couples. Do you think this arrangement could work?

Morghan:  Would it be so crazy if we bought a house and moved in together?

Emma: How would that work?

Morghan: Well, we would enter into a contract…maybe even a 10-year one…

Emma: hahaha!! But what is the arrangement?

Morghan: We could go in on a three-family home. Each of us would take a unit and we’d rent out the third as income. Whatever money we put in as equity would be separate property. Contributions to mortgage would be half, plus rent collected would be considered 50/50.

Emma: So let me dumb this down for non-lawyers: Everything would be halvsies.

Morghan: Right. We would leverage our incomes. Sorta like marriage.

Emma: Leverage not only our incomes but also other assets. Time. Child care. Efficiencies in bulk. We could help watch each others kids at times, or find more affordable child care since we’d have four kids in one place.

Morghan: Exactly!

Emma: Plus other intangibles, like companionship. Our kids would benefit from growing up in an extended family.

Morghan:  Question: who mows the lawn and cleans the gutters?

Emma:  Fuck that – we hire that out.

Morghan:  I love how you think!

Emma:  So we agree!! No fights in this partnership!

Morghan:  What could go wrong?

Emma:  Well, let’s turn this into a reality TV show and really capitalize on it. The network would no doubt do some fancy editing to insinuate that we’re undermining the other. And that there are lesbian undertones to the whole thing. Then one of us gets involved with a guy and the whole thing blows up because the other one is secretly in love with the other.

Morghan:  Won’t a super-hot lawn guy solve the problem? Just like a real marriage.

Emma:  Oh yes! But what if we fight over him?

Morghan:  LOL

Emma: OR in reality, you just get on my nerves. And we bicker and fight and break up.

Me and Morghan, at our first cohabitation experiment — the vacation rental we shared for a week. There were no fatalities.

Morghan: Just like a real marriage! But if one of us gets remarried, it would just get better, since there will be more  kids added to our nouveau Brady Bunch set-up.

Emma: Actually, this was done in Kate & Allie.

Morghan: Totally! I loved that show.

Emma:  But what if my new husband hates your ass?

Morghan:  He would…it’s big enough.

Emma:  hahah! So you just get fat, then I won’t have to worry about my fantasy husband having an affair with you.

Morghan:  Wait, which show is this turning into? Big Love?

Emma:  Maybe! So let’s back up — who gets which apartment?

Morghan:  Should we have the rental in the middle?

Emma:  Why? So we can terrorize the tenants with kid noise from the upstairs AND the downstairs?

Morghan:  I think we need the bottom floor so we have access to the yard.

Emma: OK, who gets that?

Morghan:  I want it because I’ll probably be getting a dog at some point.

Emma:  I don’t want a dog pooping in the yard. Plus, a hypothetical dog doesn’t entitle you to the better property!

Morghan:  I’m just saying it would be convenient. I expect the kids would be running up and down the stairs between houses anyway.

Emma:  Probably.

Morghan: The real fight will be over laundry use, since most of these places only have one washer/dryer.

Emma: I send my laundry out, so how about if you take the top floor with the laundry and I get the bottom with the garden?

Morghan:  Laundry is usually bottom floor.

Emma: So you get the garden AND the laundry?

Morghan: Is this going to be our first fight, honey?

Emma: I think so! And then there are other things, like what if we need a new roof and one of us doesn’t have the cash. Or we have extra cash and one wants to paint the exterior and the other wants to upgrade the heater. A million possible issues.

Morghan:  I think that the equity invested is credited when we sell, so if one pays for more of the roof, that comes out in the sale.

Emma:  That is assuming there will be a sale. We may be two divorcees bickering until our dying days in that shack.

Morghan:  Is that better than being alone? At least you’ll have someone to help you up the stairs (or push you down them).

Emma: So you really have called the basement apartment! A&E better have a big budget, our reality TV show will last 60 years.

Morghan:  Not if I don’t renew at the 10-year mark…

Related articles

• Video: Courts shut down SAHMs (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• Marriage is dead
• One spouse is not enough
• Let’s stop celebrating wedding anniversaries
• What if your failed marriage was really a success?
• Every woman needs $5,000 in her own account — even if it’s a secret (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• True story: How to squirrel away $5,000 to get out of a horrible marriage (and get the
• The Benefits of Marriage (insureyes.com)
• Marriage and parenting (rookiemoms.com)
• Supporting marriage means everybody’s marriage (theb3blog.com)
  

The post Can two straight single moms build a modern family together? appeared first on Wealthy Single Mommy.

Like many a city parent, I hear the call of the suburbs. Despite my own love of urban living, parenting energetic children makes me long for a yard and tree-lined neighborhood where Helena and Lucas can enjoy their independence, no-brainer schools and a garden where I can sink my hands into the dirt.

My own internal city-suburb mud-wrestling match is the same as every other city-dwelling parent: City is accessible to work and fun adult activities like theater, screenings and good bars. Suburbs afford families space, green, good schools and fun kid activities like bike riding and playing with other rich white children. But as a single mom, I have another weighty factor to consider: Who would I date in the suburbs?

These past few weekends some like-minded friends and I have been venturing out to some mind-blowingly attractive towns. Tarrytown, Westchester, with its funky, charming downtown that made me swoon. Maplewood, N.J., with neighborhoods so adorable I wept with desire. I was swept away in fantasy living, stalking 1920s houses on Zillow, giddily gossiping with friends about the best elementary schools. But my suburban lust was cut short when I walked around and thought:

Where are the cute guys? Oh, there’s one. But he’s wearing a ring.

A quick search on OKCupid — my main source for meeting men — netted few prospects in the suburbs on my list. Will I be forever lonely and miserable if I move to a place where I dream my kids would thrive? Is it better to give my kids a happy mom in the city, or a miserable suburban mom where they could enjoy all those communities can afford them?

“Stay in the city,” says my friend Jenny, who recently moved with her husband and three preschoolers to Long Island after a life in the city. “The people out here suck. Plus, they’re all married. You’ll never meet a guy.”

I appreciate the fact that part of the reason I enjoy dating so much at this time of my life is that I live in New York City, which has perhaps the greatest concentration of smart, interesting and creative single men in the entire world. My feelings about being a single mom would be very, very different if I lived, say, in my hometown of Sycamore, Ill., population 17,000. Sure, Tarrytown or Maplewood are within a reasonable train, bus or car ride into Manhattan. And hello!? There are datable single men in the suburbs, too! But the reality is that the population overall is less dense, and the concentration of creative professionals like myself are fewer.

But now is when I need to listen to my own advice, and remember to stay open to the magic of dating and romance. After all, of the two men I’ve been involved with in any serious capacity over the past few years, one did live in the suburbs, and the other had just relocated from one.

And if I am a cool mom living outside of New York City, there has to be one special guy who does, too.

Right?

Related articles

• Single dads face more pressure to have babies (and single moms win at dating) (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• 9 reasons dating is better as a single mom (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• On the single mom to-do list: Hang out with adults (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• Single Mom Rocks (bubbamama.com)
• Single moms (and other strong women) need alpha males (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• What It Means to Be a Single Mom (blogher.com)
• Female volunteers building home for single mother (fox13now.com)
• It’s an Obama World… Poverty Hits America’s Suburbs (thegatewaypundit.com)
• Parody: A Tribute to Working Moms (kluc.cbslocal.com)
• Video: Courts shut down SAHMs (wealthysinglemommy.com)

The post I’m afraid I’ll never meet a man if I move to the suburbs appeared first on Wealthy Single Mommy.

I was chatting with a friend whose wife recently left him for her boss. Needless to say, he’s pretty down.

“No matter the circumstances, divorce takes its toll on your self-esteem,” I told him. “When you’re ready, I highly recommend dating. There is nothing better than a fling with someone you have great chemistry with to remind you that you’re an attractive, lovable person.”

His response?

“That’s not my thing. I was never interested in hooking up with women. I always looked for love and companionship.”

He met his wife 11 years ago. He’s 40 now.

If you want to move on from divorce and heartbreak you have to let go of who you were before you married in the first place. If you want to enjoy dating now, you have to let go of how you dated back then.

If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it 1,000 times: Dating after divorce is a totally different and completely better experience than last time around. A lot has happened since you were dating back in the day. You got married, for one. Probably had kids, and went through a divorce, for crying out loud! Consider all the other life events that you contended with — job and home changes, the passing of loved ones, a Republican administration or two. All kinds of joys and heartbreak. You’re different now.

It’s normal to channel our pre-marriage selves as a point of reference when venturing out into the world as a newly single person. But doing so puts you in danger of being stuck in the past, and missing out on growth and fun and love.

Consider a woman I’ll call Amanda — the fiance of an old friend. Amanda was a teenage mom who by all accounts is a success story, raising a bright, beautiful daughter — now a college student — and building a successful career. But now, at age 37, she is in her first serious relationship since she was 19. “I had to learn how to be in an adult relationship,” Amanda said. Tensions arose with her fiance when she failed to understand why he wanted to spend time with friends, or needed own space in the house they share. “I was stuck in the last time I was involved with someone — and that was when I was a kid,” she said.

Getting stuck in old visions of yourself keeps people stuck in marriages they would rather leave. One longtime girlfriend listened — a little judgmentally, I felt — as I told her about my recent dating exploits, and how I felt so grateful to have the opportunity to find love again. “Oh, I could never do that,” she said, echoing my male friend. “I never felt comfortable casually dating.” This woman met her husband when she was 20 — 20 years ago! How does she know what her dating style would be now?

Love and romance are no different than anything else in life — you never know what you are capable of until faced with adversity. During and following my own divorce I had zero interest in dating. It was the furthest thing from my mind! I also never considered that I would be capable of financially supporting my children alone, or the professional successes I’ve achieved in the past few years.

The takeaway is that you might delight yourself. You can find new ways of being with men. You can find better ways of dating. But you have to leave behind your old notions of who you are. Once you do, you just might find new love in this new stage of life.

Related articles

• A love for different seasons (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• Dating Post Divorce – Tips, Hints & Don’t Dos (thinkingaboutgettingdivorced.com)
• Sharing Chores Make Marriages Last Longer (medindia.net)
• MyDivorcePapers.com Releases Marriage Duration Statistics (prweb.com)
• Why You Should Want a Man with Baggage (howaboutwe.com)

The post Stuck in a 20s dating mentality — even though you’re in your 30s or 40s? appeared first on Wealthy Single Mommy.

When I was in college I had a very sweet and cute boyfriend. “Do you think about getting married?” my Grandma asked me. “We all think Dave’s neat. It helps when you get married young — you grow up together.”

I understood where she was coming from. After all, she and my grandpa met in high school and were together for more than 70 years when he passed away a couple of years ago. But even at 21, I knew that her path was very different than any I could imagine for myself.

I am part of a generation that is marrying in a culture very different than any before us. We are seekers and adventurers. We attend college and graduate school in record numbers. We are unprecedented in our travel — exploring farther and more exotic locations. We dabble in religions, lifestyles and jump from job to job and career to career — all in the name of personal growth and fulfillment. How often do we read of late-life career reinventions, or parents sailing around the world when the kids fly the nest? We love nothing more than stories of people turning their lives around through weight loss and found spirituality and simpler living.

And yet we expect our marriages to survive through all these changes.

That is asking a lot of one person. For many, it asks too much.

This is where my 10-year marriage contract comes in.

Instead of seeing marriages that end as failures, what if we got realistic and embraced the fact that we often have loves for different periods of our lives. Say, a first, early marriage for the years that we become young adults, launch our careers and explore the world. A second with whom to have a family and build wealth, and yet another to fulfill our needs as we age. Or any variation the couple decides on.

When each of these unions end, we can graciously accept them as wonderful successes — relationships that supported a particular life chapter.

After all, multiple long-term relationships is how most of us live today: Dwindling numbers of us marry our first loves, and in fact are urged to “sow our oats” and “play the field” — tasting as many romantic flavors as we can before settling into one that is juuuust right. Most of us have longterm relationships before we marry, and if we divorce, go on to find love again.

Let’s embrace this reality and stop trying to shoehorn relationships into a marriage model that we, as a society, have long outgrown. The institution of marriage has changed and evolved throughout history. Today, far fewer people marry than ever before, and the numbers of people who divorce is high and stuck. Marriage as we understand it is dead, and ripe for a change.

I see this stark contrast between generations when I look at my own family. My grandparents married nearly three generations ago, and like most couples throughout history, their paths were very much intertwined from early on. They were from the same small community in Illinois, they both came from farm families and were committed to raising their four children together on their own farm, and eventually enjoying their eight grandchildren. They spent their lives with a similar set of priorities and values, attending Methodist church each Sunday and hosting weekly bridge club with friends from high school — couples who also met when very young.

When I reflect on marriages of previous generations, I appreciate very much the intimacy and stability they enjoyed. But I have a hard time applying that model to my own life. By the time I met my husband at age 25, I’d had two boyfriends, one major heartbreak and I had lived abroad three times in three different countries and backpacked around a bunch more. By then my newspaper career had already taken me to Georgia, Bulgaria and then Phoenix. And while my travels and ambition may be extreme, my sense of seeking and adventure are not.

Looking back, I see how much I needed to date Dave, who taught me that good and kind men can love me. But I knew instinctively that had I settled down then I would have resented him and adventures I would have missed, and that our visions for our young lives differed widely. I went on to be for a few years with a man who was my professional peer, but we parted ways when he decided to make a life in another country.

My husband really was juuuust right. For a time. Equally ambitions and having just come off of a year backpacking around the globe, he was as eager to have children create a home as I was. And so for the years we were together we set out to accomplish our goals: We traveled around the country and world, built our careers, nurtured friendships, and had two beautiful children who we equally adored. We also had a ton of fun.

But life changes. And people change. In our case, a terrible accident was the final cleave in a relationship already suffering at the hands of two sets of diverging priorities.

Divorce is horrible and painful. But maybe it would be less horrible and painful if we accepted that it is a likely outcome for many couples. Let’s embraced a marriage model built on reality – and not a model designed for generations past.

Other stories in this project:

• A 10-year contract will save marriage
• Marriage is dead
• Let’s stop celebrating wedding anniversaries
• What if your failed marriage was really a success?

Related articles

• A 10-year contract will save marriage (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• Marriage is dead (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• 25 ways I will be a better wife (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• 7 Things Married People Wont Tell You About Marriage. (thenuggetsofwisdom.wordpress.com)
• The number of people who are ‘married but looking’ is rapidly increasing (prweb.com)
• Oh My Marriage! (rantrantlife.wordpress.com)
• First comes home, then comes marriage? (realtygoddess.wordpress.com)
• Dear Bossip: We’re Talking Marriage & He Says It’s Sacred, Yet, I Learned He Was Sleeping With A Married Woman (bossip.com)
• Marriage v. Cohabitating (Shacking up) (beingblackinamericatoday.wordpress.com)
• Wisdom From Divorce: The Happy Marriage Facade (sincemydivorce.com)

The post One spouse is not enough appeared first on Wealthy Single Mommy.

I’ve established that marriage is dead. The model based on committing to a “soulmate” for the rest of one’s life is but a blip in the history of marriage, and it’s day has come — as evidenced by the steady, high divorce rate and dwindling numbers of people in America who get married at all. An astonishing 40 percent of people polled by Pew say the institution of marriage is obsolete.

And yet. And yet we crave that connectedness, the comfort and protection that comes with marriage. There is a reason that marriage has been part of nearly every society in history. Marriage is good, and there is an innate human drive to formally connect with our romantic partners.

I have that need. I enthusiastically married the man I loved, and just like you, I signed on to the forever-and-ever. Forget the fact that I come from divorced parents, and so does he! We all know the divorce stats. But no, no, no! Our marriage would survive, I told myself. And then, when we divorced, I was genuinely shocked. Now I see I was genuinely naive.

Here I am, past that marriage and dating again. I’ve been in couple relationships in which I start having girl thoughts about the size of car we would buy to transport our collective kids to the beach, and how we would integrate his art with mine in our charming bungalow big enough for everyone’s brood. I am not sure what my romantic future holds, but I know that the forever-and-ever model is a joke. When the thought of marriage creeps into my girl thoughts, suddenly the images of the minivan and bunkbeds go black.

I join the majority of people compelled to be married, but how could marriage possibly work for me? How can we embrace what is really going on in the world and make the institution of marriage work for everyone?

Marriage has evolved and changed throughout history. All evidence is blaring in our faces that now is a time for change.

The new model is a 10-year marriage contract.

It works like this: On the onset of the marriage the parties lay out the goals of the relationship. A prenup, but more. Decide the financial terms during the marriage, as well as how money will be dealt with should it end. Same with kids. But more than that, the contract establishes broad goals for the marriage itself: Is it for companionship? A passionate love? To bring children into the world? Build financial equity or a business?

Then, when the marriage nears year No. 9, the parties are forced to make a decision. Do they decide — amicably — that the marriage has run its course? If so, the contract has paved a path for a low-animosity split (thanks to the prenup), and the possibility for celebrating a partnership that was successful while it lasted.

Or, the couple decides to sign another 10-year contract, but with changes. Study after study find that a lack of communication is the No. 1 reason people divorce. A forced conversation about the future of a marriage can only be good for any relationship. Gone will be the days of the couch potato marriage, where everyone simply waits out the clock without actually working on the relationship.

Finally, for those who are certain their love will indeed endure for the rest of time, what could be more romantic than signing on for a lifetime of 10-year anniversaries? How delightful to look forward to decades scheduled with vow renewals?

A 10-year marriage contract embraces the human drive to formally couple. It offers the legal and emotional protection that marriage affords us, but also embraces the very realities of how we live our lives today. We no longer expect anything to last forever. Americans change careers an average of six times in their lifetime, and three out of five of us move away from our hometowns.

Most critically, many of us have long-term committed relationships before we meet our spouses, and then go on to find love after divorce. By definition, we are serial monogamists, yet the current marriage model is in direct conflict with reality. No wonder so many people are terrified of marrying – whether for the first time, or the fifth. The current marriage model asks you to front-load your investment in the relationship with an insane wedding and declarations of unwavering love, and then put on blinders to the very real possibilities of divorce for the rest of your life. Nothing makes you more vulnerable than living a lie.

The institution of marriage is in crisis.

Let’s demand a new model and save marriage. I’ll sign a 10-year marriage contract.

Will you?

**This post has been picked up by these media:**

• Woman’s Day
• Ryan Seacrest on 102.7 KIIS FM
• CafeMom’s The Stir
• Huffington Post
• The Frisky (Spin Media)
• Detroit’s Mojo in the Morning

Other stories in this project:

• Marriage is dead
• One spouse is not enough
• Let’s stop celebrating wedding anniversaries
• What if your failed marriage was really a success?

Related articles

• Marriage is dead (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• Is divorce contagious? | Babble (babble.com)
• Who Should Get A Prenup Agreement? (frankinranks44.wordpress.com)
• Elizabeth Gilbert: The bestselling “Eat, Pray, Love” author on the value of being an aunt. | Babble (babble.com)
• Love Is In The Air……….But Prenup Is In. (thestylishbitch.com)
• When It Comes to Marriage, the Second Time Is the Charm (news.softpedia.com)
• The Benefits of Marriage (insureyes.com)
• Covenant Marriage Law in Arizona (local.answers.com)

The post A 10-year contract will save marriage appeared first on Wealthy Single Mommy.

When I got married at age 28, it was the right thing for me to do. It was also my only option.

After all, I loved my husband and yearned to have children with him. Something powerful in me called out to partner with this man in a formal, meaningful way — feelings I shared with most human beings on this planet. And if you are a human being in America today, there is one path to take:

Declare your beloved a soulmate, spend tens of thousands of dollars on a wedding, and commit for the rest of your lives.

The perverse thing about that model is that it is largely fantasy, and contradicts the way most of us actually live. The reality is that there is a very excellent chance you will divorce — a fact that has held true for decades. You also likely had one or more meaningful long-term committed relationships before you got married, and, once split from your “soulmate” will go on to have meaningful, long-term relationships afterwards. Maybe you even had one or a few while you were hitched. Who am I to judge?

The depths of this fallacy run deep. The average cost of a wedding continues to tick up (as does the size of the ole engagement ring), yet every year the divorce rate stays roughly the same — even as we dump money into couples’ therapy, relationship books and sex toys in vain attempts to thwart the inevitable. Even as we work towards more civilized divorce practices (prenups, no-fault, mediation), the cost of spiting up grows more expensive. We say and spend as if we believe in the heaven-sent, lifelong love, but in practice we live by completely different rules.

I’ve been through each dramatic stage of trying to save a marriage. It seemed like the more I hung on to the glory of our first, heady years together — not to mention those few hours of that romantic, expensive wedding — the better my chances of fulfilling the status-quo marriage model. From birth I set out to live the contemporary marriage fantasy, even though the way I lived my life was completely different. After all, before I met my husband, I had one serious love – so significant that I moved to Bulgaria for the guy. And before that amour was a year-long relationship in college. I never believed in soulmates, and as a child of divorce, I knew first-hand the odds of lifelong marriage. But without any other obvious path to take, and a lack of imagination, my husband and I signed on for the Ozzy and Harriet dream.

My story illustrates how today’s definition of marriage is a joke for those of us who do tie the knot. The real, screaming signal that marriage is passé is that fewer and fewer people are getting married — including white, middle class men and women. In 1960, 72% of American adults were married; by 2010 that figured dropped to just 52%, and in that span the number of people who never married nearly doubled to 27%. Don’t take it from me: 40% of people in this country say the institution is obsolete.

Marriage in America is dead.

That’s the bad news.

The good news (which is actually more bad news), is that marriage is awesome. Study after study show that people who are married are happier, richer, healthier, live longer, have more sex. Kids who grow up in two-parent households fare better, and society as a whole thrives when people are in committed monogamous relationships. Which is why people have been getting married since Adam and Eve were demurely covering their junk with fig leaves.

But as with any element of life — work, sex, religion, politics — habits and attitudes evolve. The marriage-for-love model is a very new, less than 200 years old by most measures. And by most measures, it has past its prime.

We need marriage. As individuals, parents, children and members of society, we need marriage to work. But the model as it stands is broken.

We need a new marriage model.

Here is the answer.

Other stories in this project:

• A 10-year contract will save marriage
• One spouse is not enough
• Let’s stop celebrating wedding anniversaries
• What if your failed marriage was really a success?

Related articles

• The Benefits of Marriage (insureyes.com)
• On the Inevitable Legality of Same-Sex Marriage (reflectionandchoice.org)
• I hate marriage, and you should too (drunksskunksandhunks.wordpress.com)
• Study: Delayed Marriage Leading To More Births Out Of Wedlock, Depression (washington.cbslocal.com)
• New Sound Clip Added! Tragic Arrangements (Sex Between Whites and Non-Whites) Will Not End White Supremacy (theblackcodefiles.com)
• Clint Eastwood’s marriage on the rocks? (contactmusic.com)
• Marriage Moment Of ‘Aww’, Bride Passes Bouquet To Lesbian Sister (lezgetreal.com)
• More Young Couples Commit – To Homeownership Before Marriage (business.time.com)
• Vicki Larson: Why Wives Are Fed Up With Marriage (huffingtonpost.com)
• Is Marriage Obsolete? (everydayhealth.com)

The post Marriage is dead appeared first on Wealthy Single Mommy.

The demands on single moms’ time and emotional resources are far greater than many other demographics, and our financial resources – at least initially following a divorce – are far less. Which means we need to be as efficient as possible.

It took me a while to tune up my household’s little machine after I separated from my husband three years ago, but for the most part, I feel like I’ve got a pretty good grip on that equation: I outsource all my laundry. My lovely housekeeper Sandra visits every week. And I bask in the flexibility my home-based freelance writing career affords my family. It took me a while, but I no longer feel guilty about having my kids, ages 3 and 5, in childcare 35 hours per week. As I ramped up domestic services, I found I had more time to invest in building my business, and guess what – the more I spent outsourcing, the more I earned. I also had more time to hang out with my kids. Last week when my daughter accidentally ground colored pencil shavings into the shag rug, I could have gotten out a comb and vacuum and spent a half hour cleaning it up. Instead, the three of us rode our scooters to the local burger joint. I can afford to buy us nice scooters and organic burgers because I earn enough at my business, which I spend many hours building at a much higher hourly rate than I pay Sandra or the laundry service.

All this time-money balancing has helped me get over my fear that since I’m a single mom I would be poor and never see my kids. Instead, I have embraced my reality – which has turned out to be a delightfully challenging and rewarding place to hang out.

But what is less evident in this system are the less tangible resources that it takes to raise children – and paramount in this diagram is the required emotional support. Everyone needs emotional buttressing: that adult hug after a crappy day with the kids, or a trusted ear to bounce a new work idea off of. Even a shared laugh about the kids’ latest antics is critically important. These are needs that a healthy marriage can fulfill. When you are single, you do not have that built-in companionship.

Instead, as a single mom, I must consciously find ways to get that support in order to fill my own emotional well, which then enables me to be the fully engaged mom my kids need and a creative, productive worker. Filling this need adds an additional layer to my time-money circus: I schedule breakfasts and drinks with friends on the weekend when my children are with their dad, set up after-bedtime phone chats with old friends who live afar, and arrange workday Skype meetings with colleagues and clients from my home office, which can be quite isolating. Ensuring that I am emotionally bolstered also means that I prioritize dating – in part because I enjoy the company of men now, and also because I would like to find a partner for the long term. All these tasks take time that I could spend working, but that would leave me emotionally depleted.

One of my coping mechanism when I get stressed and overwhelmed by my single mom life is to remind myself that not all marriages are good marriages, and just because someone has a spouse does not mean that person is a true co-parent, or helpful around the house, or emotionally available. It has often been said that there is nothing lonelier than being married to the wrong person, and I know this to be true. I also know that a bad marriage can suck away one’s time, energy, emotions, and often money.

Figuring out how to create a fulfilling life as a single mom has been one of the most challenging and rewarding tasks of my life. Fitting together all the components is certainly a work in progress, one that will evolve and change as my children, business, and personal life grow and change. As it does, I expect to find myself shifting the time, money, and emotional pieces of the puzzle around to find a way to make it all work.

Related articles

• I hug my kids too much because I’m lonely (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• Single moms need to get their fat asses in shape (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• Dating Tips for Single Parents – Parenting (everydayfamily.com)
• Why I would never date single moms (geeksjourney.com)
• Single moms must let go of dreams of fulltime parenting (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• Mother’s Day Contest “A Single Mom Raising Five Kids” (donkeywhispererfarm2010.wordpress.com)
• My brother yelled at my kids and I loved it (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• 9 reasons dating is better as a single mom (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• Single dads face more pressure to have babies (and single moms win at dating) (wealthysinglemommy.com)

The post On the single mom to-do list: Hang out with adults appeared first on Wealthy Single Mommy.

The other night my single mom friend Sarah and I were IMing about how we prefer men who are aggressive in bed.

“I’m the CEO of my entire life!” Sarah complained. “Do you know how hot it is to let someone else take over for 20 minutes?”

“It’s not just in bed – give me a vacation from my life for a while,” I responded. I was referencing my weekend date — a guy I met on OKCupid named Lou who I have pretty much nothing in common with but proved to be the perfect Saturday night activity. For the past few months I’ve been in a dateless funk fueled by disappointment that a love interest didn’t pan out and a long, grey, life-filled winter. Despite being little of what I am looking for in the long-term, this Sicilian-born, Harley-riding electrical engineer from Queens charmed me with a witty profile, flirty and articulate messages and pics that suggested — quite accurately, I found — a darling smile and a 6’3″ body built like a brick shit house.

Hotness aside, I knew Lou was just what my mental health needed when he called to arrange the date. He would drive to my neighborhood, so, per protocol, I promised to text him a location to meet. “What are you talking about?” he said in a loud, friendly, Queens accent. “I’m picking you up and I’m taking you out!”

Music to my ears!

Let me back up here. If I had to describe myself — which one is prone to do when she finds herself juxtaposed with a Lou — it would be that I’m a New York intellectual who dates more or less the same. My boyfriends tend to be writers and film makers interested in lefty politics and sustainable urban development. Lots of skinny jeans, the occasional fedora and dates that involve plenty of polite negotiating and triangulating a mutually convenient meeting point. Lou is Republican who wore a gold crucifix under his slim-cut waffle shirt, and he picked me up and took me out.

When I got in the car, I immediately took to Lou’s big, warm vibe. He took my hand and kissed my cheek hello, cracking a giant, handsome smile. “What’s this?” he said. “You’re the only woman I know who doesn’t do her nails!” And off we went in his pickup all the way across Queens to a neon-lit Mexican restaurant with valet parking.

I could write a whole post on the beauty of going out with men you have no interest in dating long-term. If you don’t care if you ever see the guy again, somehow everyone is freer to be themselves — and enjoy each other more. If I was looking at Lou through relationship goggles, I might have bristled when describing his most recent relationship with a woman who moved into her new house by transporting one dining chair per day in her car.

“Look, sometimes I like to be a man, you know?” Lou said. “I told her, ‘Listen, I’ll come by Saturday with three of my friends and we’ll move you in one day.’ But she said I was being too pushy. Women!” Instead of recoiling in feminist disgust, my interest was piqued. What other ways did he like to be a man? And was he going to show me on our singular date?

That’s the thing with the Lou’s of the world, Sarah and I agreed. We love that they take over plans for the evening, and then take over our bodies for the night. When you are an independent woman with lots of responsibilities, many men assume that we want to carry out that strong role all the time. But I need to feel like a woman, and the times I enjoy that most are when I am with a man. If I am being honest with myself, being a woman means – to a degree – being passive. And that requires a man who is – to a degree – the alpha.

Lou is not going to be my boyfriend. My boyfriend will be “an artsy-fartsy guy”  (as Lou described my type) with whom I will triangulate our first date. I loved hanging out with Lou, the macho way he relived me of any responsibility for the evening, the easy way I fell into passively following his lead, crucifix dangling in my face much of the night.  But I am a woman with an opinion or 50, and a clear vision for my role in the world. I can’t imagine settling for anything less than intimacy with someone who is my partner, my equal. Can that person be someone who is totally dominant? Could I ever be happy being consistently passive?

“You’re fun to hang out with,” Lou said, pulling the covers up to his chin. “Do you like to spoon? Roll over, let me spoon you.”

And I did.

Related articles

• 10 Ridiculously Offensive Things People Tell Asian Women On OkCupid (buzzfeed.com)
• i’ve been selected as an okcupid moderator! (cndaussin.wordpress.com)
• Single dads face more pressure to have babies (and single moms win at dating) (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• 9 reasons dating is better as a single mom (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• Modern Love: OKCupid Officially Accepts Bitcoin Payments (betabeat.com)
• Never have in your dating profile picture (cubicgarden.com)
• I hug my kids too much because I’m lonely (wealthysinglemommy.com)
• She is just not into you! (earnbetta.wordpress.com)

The post Single moms (and other strong women) need alpha males appeared first on Wealthy Single Mommy.