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FeministTea👩🏻‍🎓👩🏿‍⚖️👠🥾 Regrets And Perspectives

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u/tabbarrett 12h ago edited 5h ago

People also don’t realize if the husband didn’t have the support system the wife provided with her free labor, he wouldn’t have gotten so far in his career.
As for their conversation, sounds like she already told him how she feels, he just didn’t understand what the mom meant until after she said it to the daughter. He said he just heard complaints.
People are so busy trying to protect the dad’s feeling but forget it was the mom that sacrificed everything and now they want her to sacrifice her feelings because he’s not getting it.

Edit to add - stay at home parents do give free labor. Room and board is not a payment for being a stay at home person. Marriage is not employment.

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u/Dddddd92 12h ago

This!!! Also the dad apparently put the whole burden of childcare and home making on the mom. So "i never said no to nursing school" os just a cop out. He actually didn't say yes either@

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u/Wabbit65 12h ago

Maybe he didn't feel it was his to say yes or no. But she needed to be more direct about her feelings about this decades ago, and they both need to sit down and communicate, likely with a professional moderating.

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u/Dddddd92 12h ago

Ofcourse he doesn't. Because he was content with her bearing the whole burden of the children. Why would he change anything?

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u/Gaarakhan55 10h ago

People at like all he did was work and beared no effort to kids or home while not at work.

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u/CompassMetal 10h ago

Raising children is a privilege and a pleasure. From what he said he wished he'd been able to spend that time with them. Work sucks. I mean, this is fake as hell, but come on

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u/Dddddd92 10h ago

Funny. I have heard from many male colleagues that they want to spend 2 more hours at work because home sucks with screaming kids.

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u/Carbonatite 8h ago

Funny how often men say that to women while never actually choosing to be the SAHP themselves.

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u/Magnon 7h ago

How often are men even offered that option? 1/50? Less? There's lots of men out there that could thrive being a SAHD but it's never once offered to them and they'd lose their girlfriend/wife if they brought it up.

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u/Everyday_goddess 12h ago

That’s kind of negated by him saying he never said no. If that wasn’t how he thought of it he wouldn’t have said that.

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u/luri7555 11h ago

Why? If he was single he could invest even more into his future. Marriage is supposed to be a partnership. That means both partners agree to compromise their individuality to some degree so they can better manage their family.

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u/tabbarrett 5h ago

If she’s single she can do the same too

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u/Local-Unit6548 11h ago

No, I think that you are missing the point that it is a partnership. It isn't "his career", it is "their livelihood". The mom didn't sacrifice anything. She was an essential element of a unit that created a family. Yet, at the end of the day, what she did was confess that creating children with her spouse was of less importance, and meaningful, to her in life than making money and having her own career. And the absurd irony in this, is the career she wanted. She was going to be a nurse!! A life devoted to caring for and making life better for strangers! Yet she couldn't see how valuable and important it was to care for, and make life better for her own children.

Also, she, as a mature adult, had every opportunity to choose a career over children at any point: before the first born, and after every other birth. She could have even terminated the first birth. But she remained in the partnership until finally gaslighting, disparaging, and undercutting her spouse in front of their children. Horrible and sad

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u/Ray0977 8h ago

I couldn't agree more. The fact that so many people are siding with the wife in this AI generated scenario, shows you how terrible society has become.

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u/complexdevoid 11h ago

She was the mature adult she sacrificed her career for her family. She wasn't getting the returns from her husband. How else should she protect her daughter from the same circumstances? Should she talk in fables and parables?

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u/Local-Unit6548 10h ago

She didn't sacrifice anything. She was in a partnership. A man can not even make a choice to have a baby. That can only be done by a woman. She didn't have to have a baby. She has a choice. Then she has a choice to raise a child herself, or put it in daycare.

What returns from her husband? Seems he was fulfilling his obligation in the partnership of raising the family. By continuing to have children under this scenario she is essentially accepting it as compatible.

"Protect" her daughter? That's a bit of weird, almost disturbed way to term things. Essentially what you are implying is that the children that she had, were a detriment to her life, a punishment, a sentence, that she shouldn't have been burdened with. So she is to explain to her own daughter," be careful not to get roped into having the likes of you!"

Perhaps she should simply 'explain' to her daughter that she has choices to make regarding a career, and the possibility of having children.

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u/complexdevoid 10h ago

The promises he made that he didn't keep. Which he posts himself in the conversation.
Yes. She clearly sacrificed her nursing position to run their family as she stated.
Yes if she feels burdened she feels burdened. and? She doesn't want her daughter to be burdened. Protecting her daughter is weird? And disturbing? You want to try that again? Protecting her daughter is weird and disturbing? Protecting her daughter is weird and disturbing. Yes I did that on purpose just in case that didn't stick out in the first place. You just want women to be silent

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u/Local-Unit6548 10h ago

Well, by the way you communicate, I can see how you might agree with her position. So it's not surprising that you aren't able to see what she did as abusive and gaslighting.

You are the sexism that you disparage.

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u/complexdevoid 10h ago

By the way I am communicating? Clearly unequivocally? Let's get this straight. Communication, expressing feelings, providing information on life experience, and let's not forget protecting a daughter is disturbing and weird, equals sexist?

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u/Local-Unit6548 9h ago

Yes, absolutely by the way you are communicatin: repeating things twice for some strange reason of emphasis and then stating a completely unsubstantiated claim about me. But just go back and read that post and tell yourself that it is: clearly unequivocally?", and not rather confusing, and poorly written.

Are you repeating things twice because you think I don't have the capacity to understand, or because you believe you are of superior intellect? Either way, it's just very condescending.

When you say, "you just want woman to be silent", when you really have no basis for such a statement, and don't know my background, then yes, that is a sexist statement. You are insinuating that I am a chauvinist or have chauvinistic tendencies. So it would seem pretty obvious that your perception of things is clouded by gender issues. You aren't even aware of how skewed your perceptions of things are. You aren't looking at things, and especially this instance, as an issue between two people, but something between a man and a woman, and obviously you have preconceived beliefs about how it should play out.

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u/complexdevoid 8h ago

What perceptions? I consistently use,refer , and quote the texts which is all we have to go on. I repeat just as you have. I don't deviate I have no problem with a parent preventing their child's future unhappiness

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u/Local-Unit6548 8h ago

Ahhhh, LOL. Did you even read what I wrote, did you have difficulty understanding it, or are undergoing cognitive dissonance because you don't want to acknowledge something about your own character?

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u/977888 11h ago

She sacrificed her career and the man sacrificed half his life for 19 years to keep them fed and housed while his wife resented him for it.

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u/complexdevoid 11h ago

Yes. And guess what he could have avoided all that if he had listened the first time she said something leading to this instead of making promises he doesn't keep. The wife shared her life experience in context of the very life decision her near adult child is about to make. Relevant and necessary

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u/977888 10h ago

Then she should have been an adult and communicated directly instead of trying to drop hints like some sort of game. Men are exhausted from women crafting these weird subliminal messages and expecting them to be mind readers. If you have a problem, you need to be an adult and voice that. She ruined her own life due to her poor communication skills.

He never stopped her from going. He never forced her to have children or be with him. She just wants someone to blame now that she feels regret for her own choices.

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u/complexdevoid 10h ago

She did by the texts own script. He promises. He fails. He says it will be different this time . She says I heard that one before. They have been communicating. He has been failing. She has no problem getting her point across to her daughter. Seems like she communicates just fine. That fact that it hurt daddy's feelings is unfortunate but necessary

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u/Time-Weekend-8611 9h ago

She did by the texts own script.

She dropped passive aggressive hints and got mad when her husband turned out to not be a mind reader.

At no point did she open her mouth and say, "Let's put a pause on kids because i want to go back to nursing school."

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u/complexdevoid 9h ago

You know them? Because I am providing from the texts

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u/CptJackParo 11h ago

Thats a decent amount of survivorship bias tbh. If she hadnt, they may have ended up homeless, in poverty due to him losing his job.

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u/tabbarrett 5h ago

If she was able to do nursing school in the beginning like she was suppose to they wouldn’t be homeless

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u/MedusasMum 12h ago

This thread is gross.
Sounds like a lot of young and old people saying coercive abuse is normal and all the mom’s fault.
I’m tired of people thinking this way.
It’s the reason why emotional abuse and coercive control is still rampant in our country.
But maybe the people sticking up for dad are the type of people that are coercive abusers…

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u/benvader138 12h ago

The mom is very selfish here

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u/SockPuppyMax 12h ago

Selfish for giving up her career to make sure they could take care of their children? Be so for real right now

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u/StreetCollar2708 10h ago

I don't get this kind of thinking. Her body, her choice. Right? If she wanted to have a career instead of children, she was the ultimate decision for that. But she chose to have the kids, was the father not supposed to work either? It's not like he was off gallivanting across the globe or anything. He was working to provide for 5 people. He did make sacrifices himself. Why is him having to with with to provide for 5 people considered him being selfish? You're telling me you would rather work to mange with money to support a family of 5 rather than do something else? Could you support a family of 5 on your current income right now? How much more time and energy would it take you to actually do that?

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u/ShoddyAsparagus3186 11h ago

Selfish for blaming her husband when she never talked to him about it.

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u/SockPuppyMax 11h ago

She said she made choices she regrets, and those choices were made to support her husband. That's not blaming him. Also he said in the post itself, she had been saying things the WHOLE TIME, he just didn't realize it

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u/ShoddyAsparagus3186 11h ago

"Never give up your future for a man the way I did for your father."

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u/SockPuppyMax 11h ago

Yeah, she owned up to it, "the way I did"

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u/ShoddyAsparagus3186 11h ago

She owned up to making a choice to benefit him without talking about it with him. In doing so, she blamed him for an outcome that he was unaware was bad for her.

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u/SockPuppyMax 11h ago

You're assuming they didn't talk about it, but OP says in his post they couldn't afford childcare. They most likely talked about it and decided since his career had already lifted off, hers could be let go

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u/KeyFeeFee 11h ago

If he was unaware then he was entirely daft. Like how little emotional intelligence is needed to notice how saying no to a career she wanted was damaging for her?

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u/Sen_Gargoyle_D-NY 9h ago

Ungrateful.

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u/MedusasMum 11h ago

You don’t understand the meaning of the word.
Team Dad people are either like him or are not educated enough to know what coercive abuse is.
How awful.

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u/benvader138 9h ago

The selfish part is her saying that in front of their children. She's using their children against him, which is textbook Emotional Manipulation. Saying that privately, if she were talking one on one with her daughter is fine. But bring up "Oh, I regret my whole life because your father made me give up my dreams to raise you kids" in front of the whole family is a very narcissistic, selfish, and vindictive thing to do.

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u/Time-Weekend-8611 9h ago

Oh my god, stop infantilizing women.

At any point she could have opened her mouth and said "Let's put a pause on kids because I want to finish nursing school." But she didn't.

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u/MedusasMum 9h ago

Eww.
Nothing I wrote infantilizes women. You may be able to read the definition of it but you can’t grasp the concept.

She did open her mouth.
Stop gaslighting for coercive controlling men.

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u/Time-Weekend-8611 9h ago

"Said it in small ways" is not opening your mouth.

"I want to put a pause on kids and go to nursing school" is opening your mouth.

Stop gaslighting men for not being mind readers.

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u/MedusasMum 8h ago

Eww.
Go away.

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u/[deleted] 7h ago

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/MedusasMum 7h ago

Projection.
Responsibility & my actions aren’t anything you know about.
Stick to what you know, oh one who can’t leave others alone.
Odd that this post and my comments riled you up.
Seek therapy.

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u/throwawayshmoaway411 6h ago

Found the femcel.

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u/throwawayshmoaway411 6h ago

So you think not being a mind reader is coercive abuse?

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u/tabbarrett 5h ago

It’s patriarchy. Be a housewife is no problem if the woman chooses it. But if it’s because she has to give up stuff by providing free labor it becomes an issue.

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u/phdoofus 9h ago

I think a LOT of people realize that. Most normal people do. She didn't really have a direct conversation with him about it from the sound of it. Sounds like a lot of off hand comments that aren't really getting to the core of the issue.

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u/Turkeysocks 8h ago

She did not have a career. She was just accepted into nursing school. Getting accepted into nursing school does not mean one will have a nursing career. She could have ended up dropping out (for reasons other than her husband and kids) or failing. And, even if she actually did pass and start a job, 50% of nurses quit within their first two years.

https://nurse.org/news/half-of-new-nurses-quit-within-2-years/

Also your idea that he wouldn't have gotten as far in his career without his wife being there to do "free labor" to support him is false. If he never married her or had kids, he would've gotten just as far in his career. There are lots of older single guys who have never married and have great careers. There are also many single fathers out there who get excel in their careers without a wife.

No, it does not sound like she actually talked to him. Making small comments here and there complaining about housework is not the same as sitting down and communicating that she felt screwed over for not going to nursing school.

The husband certainly should be called out for not communicating with his wife, but the wife absolutely needs to be called out too. Cause she's basically not just calling out her husband, but also her kids too.

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u/Moiraine-FanBlue 8h ago

Sure he could have. It's not kind to say, but he doesn't *need* the wife or the children to continue in his career.

The support system was that *someone* has to take care of the kids, and someone has to pay for it.

He could have simply divorced her, walked away, and paid child support and entirely ignored the childrens existence other than that.

That would have also enabled him to continue in his career.

It would not be a loyal, kind, or loving thing to do. But it was completely legally his option to pursue.

Regardless of the moral or ethical parts of it, the legal reality that every woman in most countries face
is that she is GOING to end up the physical caregiver of the children she bears unless she is rich enough and established enough in a very well paying career to be able to pay for 24/7 childcare.

The legal system as it stands essentially says the man has done his legal part of the job the moment he meets the financial necessities of raising the children.

The free labor she is providing isn't to him, incidentally.

She's providing the labor *To the State*.

Which legally requires that parents take care of and not abandon their children.

Her husband isn't the one who is going to put her (or himself) in prison for child neglect.

The state will do that, if she simply abandons the children and he follows suit, in order to pursue a career.

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u/Wonderful_Store2340 8h ago

This notion that a wife gives her labour for free is comical. As a stay at home dad my job is 10 times easier than my wife’s. It takes me a couple hours tops each day to stay on top of chores then I have most of the day to myself whilst the kids are at school. Cooking, cleaning, taxi service when the kids need to go somewhere. Doesn’t even come close to a full working week. And I get the added benefit of actually getting to spend time with my kids.

I find it wild how many women complain about ‘having to look after their kids’ as if it’s a job.

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u/SirSafe6070 7h ago

so, first of all, it wasnt free labor. He had to pay her bills, live in a bigger house so more rent, more electricity, more water and food consumption, clothes, etc.

secondly, plenty of single men are very successful in their careers, so the idea he wouldn't have gotten far without her is kinda ... dumb? Consider that without her, he also wouldn't have the children to care for.

Thirdly, getting a promotion and a raise isn't really the life fulfilling lottery ticket you and her might think, especially considering most people actively hate their job. He clearly would have preferred to stay at home with his children than toil away for some boss who would gladly throw him out the moment he stopped being useful for the company. He took up all that stress normal work comes with so that neither his wife nor his children would have to know what its like to be growing up homeless. Now idk about you, but I wouldnt want to live on a mom's nurse income alone.

Fourthly, the mom did not sacrifice everything. She had her children. Unless she didn't want them - in which case it's questionable why she got 3 - she did get something she wanted. She sacrificed one dream for another. And he sacrificed one dream for another.

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u/tabbarrett 5h ago

So she’s a nanny and maid. Got it. I’m not talking about single men or any other situation except when a wife has to give up something and the husband doesn’t realize it. You’re also making hypothetical situations that aren’t there. They both wanted children. Not just her. There’s nothing that was just for her. The husband got his career and she wasn’t able to have her.

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u/BilbaoBoggins 12h ago

You don't know that. Plenty of single people progress in their careers just fine.

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u/Brave-Cap4291 12h ago

Yes, single people. He is equal to single because he didn't have to think of dinner and kids and that he has to clean their shit. He's equal to single people, she is not

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u/KeyFeeFee 11h ago

Exactly this. He had the benefit of coming home to food and meals and clean clothes and someone to talk to that he would not have had without her work. He lived better than a single person and got perks for it.

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u/phantasticpipes 11h ago

?

He absolutely would have all of that while single and more simply by paying for it instead of spending money on a family. Hiring cleaners and ordering takeout is so much cheaper than being married with children.

I have no dogs in this race but it’s absurd to see people argue that being single is worse for your career. It probably literally never is

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u/BilbaoBoggins 9h ago

He is clearly not equal to single. He's financially supporting 5 people on his own. Just because he's taken on a different burden doesn't mean he's unburdened.

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u/_WeAreFucked_ 11h ago

The mother made a choice and being a Mother is something beautiful, a reward unto itself.

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u/Carbonatite 8h ago

Not when you end up sacrificing your dreams and goals for it the way the woman in the post did.

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u/_WeAreFucked_ 7h ago

Choices have consequences, she should have stopped after one child and focused on her career.

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u/InAJar112 11h ago

The married men I work with come with lunches packed for them. I try not to feel jealous of that, but sometimes I do. Especially if I was too busy to really pack one.

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u/Conscious-Wind-7785 12h ago

Ultimately though she didn't sacrifice anything for him, she did it for the kids. Early on it doesn't sound like there was another option they could go with because school isn't going to pay the bills while he stays home.

Having kids is what left them with one solid option.

FeministTea👩🏻‍🎓👩🏿‍⚖️👠🥾 Regrets And Perspectives

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