Slightly offended DGM announced I 'married well'

@EdgyCat

Your compromise is that you see him less and his compromise is not seeing his family much AND being responsible for their income.

Her compromise is ALSO that he is not around much to share in the day to day drudgery and responsibility of parenting and domestic work.

Unless you don't think this is any sort of work or effort

And he married well in that he married someone willing to take on the lions share of domestic and parenting responsibilities enabling him to work away from home so much of the year.

And presumably he married well in choosing someone with compassion at the heart of their nature and who has the capacity to do the lions share of parenting abd enabling his career to progress by enabling him to work away all the time.

But you have married well! What’s wrong with saying it?

In comparison to you, I’ve spent my working life unable to pursue a passion due to the simple fact that it could not pay any of my bills without a significant financial investment upfront (training), and I don’t have money or a rich husband who could bear the financial burden while I do what I love.

You have the luxury of being able to do what you love and not worry about money. You’re very much an outlier.

I say this without envy. It’s just baffling to me that you don’t see that the only reason you can do this is thanks to your husband being a high earner = marrying well (if he’s also a nice person and it sound like he is).

Nobody is questioning your ‘contribution to society’ but it’s also not wrong to point out that you are able to do it because you love it and because money is not something you have to worry about, thanks to your husband.

Btw, I’d say the same if you were a man married to a wealthy woman and complaining about being described as having married well.

But you have. Well done.

The poster thinks it’s the 1950s who on earth thinks a man can’t have a family and support unless he’s some little woman behind him. Bloody hell

OP, I married well too.
I'm not offended the slightest, in fact I'm very fortunate and grateful to have the life I always wanted.
45 yo, no kids.

Absolutely. I don’t recognise the idea that the lower earner (and guess what, it is seldom the man…) ‘naturally’ takes a professional step back when the couple have children. DH earns more than I do because he left the field we both trained for in favour of a more lucrative one, but this doesn’t mean he or I accept he does less parenting, less household gruntwork, or that my career is less important.

I dont see the issue tbh.

You do appear to have married well.

Very few people are high earners at a young age, though.

When I met DH he was only on minimum wage. He now earns well above that running a very successful business - I would absolutely say I "married well" in that respect, especially as his income gives me the ability to work in a field that's very much my passion - I couldn't do that if he didn't earn what he does.

He (or she if the roles were swapped) could not have had both a career and a family without the OP's support

How do you figure that out? Loads of families manage just fine with two full time workers

Everyone saying op married well. We don’t know that.

In my case dh and I were both low earners but his career took off and anyone looking at us 10 years later may say I married well.
In actual fact I met and married a man who built a career but at the point we got married he was an administrative assistant.
I didn’t bag a wealthy man.

I suspect they think ‘Isn’t John great for picking up the children from nursery so that Susan can work? And him a CEO!’

Does your job only bring in pennies, and can you only do it because your husband earns enough to cover all the bills?

If not, it's nothing like OP's situation.

That is what you are saying. Its a very patriarchal attitude assigning low status to women's work.

Nice try.

However, I'm not the OP's grandmother.

I'm simply keeping what she said in the context of 'marrying well', which is about wealth.

I always wonder how people who think like this think two-career families like ours work.

It's not about the size of the contribution, but OP could be as wonderfully supportive as she liked. If she'd married a poor man, she either would have to be doing different work to that which she prefers, or she'd be poor.

Well, do you think you ‘married well’? To me, no amount of income would be worth having a perennially absent spouse and a father to my child who is usually not around to co-parent— and I was not put into the world to arrange my professional life around someone else’s job because they earn more. So by my view, you married someone who’s a bit of a dud, and who forced certain accommodations and compromises on you. But it’s your life and your call, obviously.

Yep, exactly the same in my family.. the fact I managed to get to Director level in my own right is irrelevant because DH has a ‘good job’ .. so frustrating!

So money is a bigger contribution that raising the family or running the house and contributing to wider society? The OP should be grateful to her DH for "allowing her" to pursue her interests but he owes her no equivalent gratitude for allowing him to do the same? Just because the more commonaly male role is financially rewarding rather than socially valued.

That is what you are saying. Its a very patriarchal attitude assigning low status to women's work.

He (or she if the roles were swapped) could not have had both a career and a family without the OP's support.

She shouldn't have said that....but I wouldn't say she's entirely wrong. Having a husband who is financially secure and successful in their career generally makes a woman's life a lot better than having a husband who is not financially secure and successful.

But you did - you found a partnership that lets you live the life and have the career that is meaningful to you. That is marrying well, in my opinion.

My Gran told me that my husband was very attractive and that I'd 'done well' to land him. I mean, she was in the early stages of dementia and wildly flirting with all manner of men, but she's also not wrong 😆

TBH and mens achievement too is who they marry and if they marry well eg. well off family or high earning, it’s a big plus, Sunak did very well in marriage and his dc will benefit.

Yes, but in the context of wealth (which married well means) the OP is 'earning pennies' whilst supporting her husband.

Many women earn much more while still supporting theirs.

So again in the context of wealth, she married well and he married a supportive woman who indulges her passion.

It's still really really true that the most important decision a woman will ever make is who will be the father of her children.

Money isn't all of that by any means, but it is an important aspect.

It might be unpalatable, but it's true.