I Thought I Was an Independent Woman

But this is what my marriage counselor told me

“What were you thinking?” asks my marriage counselor.

“What do you mean?” I say.

“You asked nothing of your husband,” he says.

“I thought I was being kind,” I say. “My mom raised five children by herself. She was my role model. She did it all and she made it look easy. My life seemed luxurious next to hers so I felt grateful. She was incredibly independent and she raised independent children.”

Not long after this, I am chatting with my friend.

We are bemoaning our marital issues.

“I’m going to raise my daughter to be extremely independent,” she says.

“Are you kidding me?” I say. “It turns out that’s what got us into trouble. We had zero boundaries and could do it all. We didn’t ask for help in any area of our life and when we did it didn’t turn out well for us.”

My husband implied we lived a traditional marriage.

He was the man who went to work and I worked out of the home raising our children. The narrative worked for him and honestly, I didn’t have a problem with it.

In reality, I should have made it clear our relationship was not traditional. It was anything but that. Yes, technically he did go to work each day. But he left out a teensy little detail.

It was in a business that I left my own job in my twenties to help build.

That’s a pretty large fact. I didn’t need to let the world know my contributions. Those closest to us did realize it. Our family and friends lived it and watched my years of work. Not to mention his big ask of leaving my own profession and the sacrifice it was.

My husband went back and forth to work.

But it wasn’t traditional.

I paid our home bills, I took care of home repairs, I paid the bills for our business and investment properties, I managed the rentals, I managed car purchases, insurance policies, mortgages, etc. I did the mulching until we eventually hired a landscaper.

This supposedly traditional man wasn’t maintaining anything.

Until I told him I was thinking of leaving him. Then he suddenly wants to take over paying the bills. He didn’t have responsibilities with our children. I was successful in convincing him to coach when our guys were little.

He protested at first and said he was a busy man.

He went to one meeting and it turns out the guys went to the bar afterward.

Suddenly he was all in.

One day in counseling my husband says, “Can you believe she’s got me driving these kids here and driving these kids there?”

I am shocked he utters these words to a marriage counselor.

“What were you thinking?” I say as we get into the car.

“What?” he says.

“Who says that to a marriage counselor?” I say. “You admitted you don’t do anything and resent having to do it.”

“Oh, that,” he says. “He’s old school.”

In what can only be described as arrogance meets a lack of reality, my husband believed the marriage counselor would feel his pain. Why? Because he was an older man.

Age equaled the ability of an older guy to recognize what a traditional man should tolerate and not tolerate.

At least in my husband’s distorted version of reality.

All this time later, I can’t believe I ever lived with, let alone loved a man like this.

I thought I was an independent woman. I took pride in feeling like I could do it all. I judged the needy women. I judged the nagging women. I judged the uptight women.

But I was actually the extreme.

I didn’t realize my independence would cause an imbalance in my relationship. I didn’t have a balance. I could have been independent while having healthy expectations and limitations.

I could have been occasionally needy, nagging, or even uptight. It wouldn’t have been the end of the world. I could have asked for more.

All I can say is…

Thank God for really great marriage counselors.

And divorce.