Women | Lifestyle
A Woman’s Dream Life: My Wife’s Story
Living the fairytale.
What is a woman’s dream life? I had to look this one up to not depend on my current knowledge. I personally thought the majority of women dream of having a family. If also employed, they preferred good-paying office jobs or serving fields such as nursing (as nursing is primarily woman-dominated).
Research
What does research show?
The first source is Auður Magndís Auðardóttir & Annadís Greta Rúdólfsdóttir (2022) First an Obstacle, Then Every Woman’s Dream: Discourses of Motherhood in Print Media, 1970–1979 versus 2010–2019, NORA — Nordic Journal of Feminist and Gender Research, 30:4, 236–248, DOI: 10.1080/08038740.2022.2139753
Motherhood was affectively and discursively defined as the element that fulfilled women’s needs and aspirations.
The second source is Niemistö, C., Hearn, J., Kehn, C., & Tuori, A. (2021). Motherhood 2.0: Slow Progress for Career Women and Motherhood within the ‘Finnish Dream.’ Work, Employment and Society, 35(4), 696–715. https://doi.org/10.1177/0950017020987392
Respondents with no children were very aware of the time pressure and challenges of balancing career and family. Thus, a common way of talking about combining a career with children was to work diligently for a period, advance to middle management level, and then take a break and start a family.
The reported balance between dedication to work in the knowledge-intensive business sector and prioritisation of family was subtle (Berg, 2008), especially for highly educated women, whose high standards at both work and home extend to motherhood. Even within the relatively egalitarian context, these women assumed the role of primary carer and ‘good mother’.
What do you dream about deep down?
Having dreams has nothing to do with the process of success or the dream. It’s just a dream. I have dreams myself. Real big ones, with no true possible path, but I still dream of them. I know women who have dreams of marriage, but they can’t find a good man, but it’s still a dream. And it’s a good dream.
Another source is Salaha Khan & Jeanne C. Watson PhD (2005) The Canadian immigration experiences of Pakistani women: Dreams confront reality, Counselling Psychology Quarterly, 18:4, 307–317, DOI: 10.1080/09515070500386026
Other research has shown that a primary motivation for immigrants is to fulfil their dreams of growth and prosperity and desire to provide a better future for their families (Maraj, 1996).
Although we have a massive, massive range of humans in the world I only talk about the thoughts and dreams that stick to a person like it’s a neurological synapse.
- Home to relax and kick back in, with feelings of security
- People around that uplift and encourage — family
- Health
- No financial stress
I think most people subconsciously know that poverty is a trap. Close to slavery. I would call it political slavery. Working oneself out of health, with little energy to spend anywhere other than a little house to try to reenergize for the next day, and no money to give a child world experiences or to make legroom for learning and personal growth. Everyone’s dream is not to be in that situation.
Dreams and goals are not the same things, either. A dream is something that gives you a permanent feeling and a goal is something really cool to check off a Christmas list, “yay! I was able to save $25,000 for my house downpayment!” — so, the dream was the house and the savings was a goal.
Some women believe having the best job is a dream. My wife has something to that, too.
My Wife’s Dream
My wife always wanted a family deep down, but to have a family in her last relationship would not be a dream. A headache and heartache. So for over 10 years, she settled with what she thought she had to. “I did not want a kid with him, so I just watched the clock tick away.” She became unhealthy in ways if you were to ask her. This makes sense, we see people let themselves go all the time when they get into a relationship that is not healthy. A healthy relationship will make you want to keep working on yourself.
My wife hated snow. We grew up in Pennsylvania, where snow is common between October and March.
My wife hated banking. She was in banking for 13 years.
Her life made her depressed.
Where is She Now?
Her marriage: In her own words, as I cannot say anything non-bias about myself, “When we first dated I wanted to have kids with you immediately.” She still says the same thing today, saying, “I would do it all the same with you.”
My wife loves to take a nap with our baby on the weekends, and we have a good mattress that she can sleep on all day and be comfortable.
Job
My wife has got a new job in Accounts Payable at a great company. She really enjoys her work! Women love to love work. Women thrive in offices where women can be women. At my wife’s company, that is the case. Not only that, but she is lucky enough to be on salary in a company that doesn’t push anyone to work more than 40 hours a week.
In the beginning, the company offered to do the following for her to come to the job interview:
- pay for a plane trip. Both ways, obviously
- pay for a rental car
- and pay for a hotel
On the day of the interview, they even took her to lunch at an expensive restaurant.
The job offer: she was upfront about another job offer from another company, that had a time limit, as soon as she knew about it. The company called her the same day and asked her how much they were offering. Then right there over the phone told her they would beat it and that she was hired. On a side note, I helped her with her employment stuff and preparation, as she says.
There have been many times when she and her whole office was home early on Fridays. There were days when she was sick and no one at the company had a harder work schedule because she had to go home early — and did not have to work from home.
Her company is very kind to its employees and gives words of affirmation. She worked there for a few days short of 3 months before she gave birth to our daughter and the company’s HR office battled for her to still get disability for the time off. Plus, the company pays 2 weeks' salary for their employees giving birth until the disability kicks in.
At my wife’s 6-month mark of working there, the company needed her to pick up a different type of payable work for a sub-company. They boosted her pay by $7,000 a year.
And did I mention they give her time to pump milk for our daughter? They do that, too.
I mention all this to say that I congratulate my wife for reaching beyond her employment dreams. My wife is living the life millions of women work hard to achieve. I hope that all women reach their dreams! I love seeing dreams come true!
I am here to foster my wife’s dream, as she does mine. And to make sure her dream furthers its completeness.
It’s humbling to see that my wife has almost the whole dream of most women. I’ve told her from day one of being with her that her life will be a testament to possibility. I’ve never let her settle for less than a dream. I do not do that myself, either.
Our dreams have come together to make one dream we both love.
Soon, maybe not in the next year or so, but soon, we will break ground for our dream home. Everyone we know has said all negative things about the market. I know this is about women and my wife, but I want to mention that I’m not someone who gives a shit about what markets look like. Then I’ll wait it out… duh. I will have my life. That’s just it. And so will she. I’ll repeat, we will break ground and we will not even settle for a construction company that will not build it. My washer and dryer do not belong anywhere except where my arms stretch comfortably out without me bending and spinning upside down while standing and that’s that (that’s just an example).
Conclusion
It’s not all about hard work, but if hard work is required, we need to be able to do it. My wife learns what she doesn’t already know to make it happen. It’s hard work for me to write real-life things with only having 1 hour a day, against people with 100k followers who write about stories that have already been published by someone else and who’s been on Medium since day 1. It’s hard work to be authentic, even if you’re a professional in a field.
It’s not about education. My wife does not have a college degree and makes more than I did in my job and works 2 to 10 hours less a day at the same time. Those in finance see where I went with that. This means, she then makes more than that against me if I only worked 40 hours a week. My average week was 50 hours a week and way more driving time, in a position that required a degree, and still made less. My wife has made it. And it’s only up from here.
Do not give up on your dream. If your dream is to find a good man, I have dozens of articles that you can read which will help you out, in actuality. My job is to make sure your life is grandeur. I hate to say I’ve only read like 1% of Medium articles that were helpful, but that is the real statistic. Which, I guess, according to what’s true, makes me the king of psychology on Medium. I’m good with that. Someone has to take leadership, that’s how the world works. If no one else can hack it, then I’ll be the Medium King of Psychology and keep my humility intact — I know the Gifts I’ve been graciously given.
To conclude, go Jessica Lyon!!! Keep showing women what’s possible! Women can have a man they love more than they ever they thought they would love a man, have a good job, and have a lovely start to a family!
It’s possible for everyone, but know your weaknesses.
Thank you all for reading! Please give my wife a generous amount of claps (for she also writes here and will see this)!! Thank you for positive comments! Thank you for sharing!
P.S. Good Men Project, please keep my cover image. And keep the links to the other articles below. Thank you.
