What It’s Like to Be in A Gender-Equal Marriage

And why I could never go back to traditional values

After a year of living in Denmark, a tiny country that prides itself on being one of the happiest, greenest, and most progressive nations in the world, I returned to the U.S. with my then-future husband. I ended up in a gender-equal marriage faster than I could say “hej.”

Before my trip to Denmark, gender equality was just one of those trendy things they talked about on TV. My father still doesn’t know how to feed himself, so I hardly had the best example growing up.

But in Scandinavia, equality of the sexes is as real as sexism is in the U.S. Scandinavians have moved on from talking about it to living it so long ago that Danes get genuinely surprised when they find out things aren’t as progressive in the rest of the world.

But here in the U.S., we like our traditional values like we like our guns. I took my husband’s last name (very un-Danish of me), so as not to confuse the American authorities. But after that, I had to learn to see things through my husband’s progressive perspective.

With time, I realized it was the only way forward, not just for us but for any society.

In a society where women are treated, respected, and paid the same as men, they can come to their full potential. And quite possibly, this is what the world needs.

For me, this is what it’s like to be married to a true egalitarian.

We have separate bank accounts

Yes, my husband and I have his money and my money. To my dad, it was a shocking discovery. To me, it was a slow realization that that’s the way things should be.

The truth is I like having my private bank account. It’s my long-lived pet, and I’ve grown quite attached to it. I don’t see why I’d have to give up every bit of my identity with marriage.

And honestly, I don’t need to see what my husband paid for his lunch, and he hardly cares what I spent on make-up.

I did have to teach my husband to pay for restaurant dinners though. It’s just one American habit I couldn’t shake off. But I make sure to buy the drinks afterward.

I’m not expected to cook or clean

In our house, my husband does the cooking on many nights, even though he only mildly enjoys it. In Denmark, boys are brought up with homemaking classes, just like girls, and a modern Danish man would never assume that his “wife’s place is in the kitchen.”

With a family of five, cooking can become an overwhelming task for one person. Luckily, my husband rarely dares to suggest that I should make dinner. Instead, whoever has the time to spare steps in. And that to me seems like the only logical way of doing it.

I still do most of the cleaning, but that’s because I’m a neat freak. Though I’m sure that if I let the house go, my husband would roll up his sleeves and pick up the toilet brush.

We contribute equally to childcare

My husband and I both work from home, and our time taking care of our baby daughter is divided equally. It would never occur to him to assume otherwise. The amount of time each of us contributes to diapers, walks, and feedings depend solely on a person’s workload.

Trying to balance two business schedules and a baby does get complicated, and heated, but at least I’m never made to feel that my work is less important than my husband’s. The amount of money made defines priority in our house, not gender.

A married friend of mine in an old-fashioned relationship regularly complains about her husband who, despite having extra time on his hands, sees his occasional childcare duties as a favor to his wife. On top of that, she’s expected to feed and clean for him, leaving her with no time to develop a small business idea she’s been thinking of. In return, she gets a “man’s man.”

Thanks, but I’ll take a diaper-changing man any day.

We both work

I used to be jealous of the girls who spent their days “pursuing their art” while their boyfriends or husbands paid their bills. I dreamt of all the books I could write while my husband was at work. The truth is I would go batshit crazy.

I’m at my happiest when I can contribute. In my house, we focused on where we want to be five years from now and how much that life will cost us. Then we agreed on who can make what and how soon to get us there. End of discussion.

Women in Scandinavia work and they’re happy to work. Generous maternal and paternal leave, quality subsidized daycare, and shorter work hours mean that a woman, or any parent, doesn’t ever have to choose between work and family, let alone suffer burnout.

Sadly, my husband arrived in the U.S. with the same expectations, only to learn that if you combine raising children and working in the U.S., burnout is inevitable.

I don’t expect my husband to do “manly” things for me

My husband is not a guy to carry my bag or to hold a door open for me. Not unless I ask him to. He’s not a jerk. He’s simply conditioned to ignore those urges, if he ever had any. In Denmark, opening a door for a woman can be taken as an insult, so men stopped trying a long time ago.

But whenever I find myself thinking that my husband should do this or that “because he’s a man,” I remind myself that I am rarely expected to contribute anything of womanly nature. Fair enough.

Scandinavians barely make a distinction between men and women, so a wife chopping wood is as common of a scenario as a husband cooking breakfast. Because, really, why not?

Still, I feel that sometimes my husband needs to be reassured of his “manliness,” so now and then I comment on how well he handles things (even if I could easily do those things myself).

It turned out that I was a fan of a gender-equal marriage, even if I didn’t know that going in. I don’t build up (as much) resentment or snap (as often) as I have in my previous relationships. I’m more productive and less stressed. I’m happier.

I couldn’t go back to doing all the cooking and scrubbing dishes, because I have as much to say and do as my husband. Luckily, he would never ask for that.

There’s one problem with this equality thing though — I’m not “needed” as much.

My daughter’s first word was “dada.” My husband could replace me with a cleaning lady.

But hey, such is the downside of having the freedom to be whoever you want.