To think you should never cohabit with a man unless he’s paying the majority of the bills?

[ThisSereneSnail]

Split finances = split energy.

Thanks for being so honest, it can be hard on here when people will jump on you.

It sounds like this is very much about your aspirations and personality, and your own family's choices about how to split the responsibilities of having a family and raising children.

I am completely on board with that.

I do have an issue with the OP telling me that this is the natural order of things and what everyone should be doing. I am also a firm believer that what is being described as feminine traits are a result of social conditioning not biological differences and so I do struggle a bit with the idea of women being divine. I think whoever the primary carer is will be more tuned in to the children's needs and emotionally connected, regardless of sex.

How would you feel if your children grew up to be gay or lesbian?

What's wrong with IVF?

No problem, I get that with my username many people might wonder the same.

Yes I appreciate that many people feel like you do, and there will be many who also feel like the OP.

My personal belief is more aligned with the OP but I very much think each to their own and I get we are all so different.

At the end of the day, it’s important that whoever your partner is shares the same values as you do - what everyone else thinks is irrelevant really, provided that you’re not hurting anyone.

It’s hard to wade through the utter wank you’re writing, but I think you are (badly) expressing that when women are taking on more of one type of responsibility (in your example, emotional labour / mental load), men should take on more of another (finances).

Yes, that’s something most women won’t argue with - splits don’t have to be 50/50 on everything, just as long as it’s 50/50 overall.

Where you are going wrong (beyond the bullshit TikTok therapy speak) is suggesting that there is a natural connection between men and providing, women and emotional labour.

None of that is natural, it’s entrenched gender stereotyping born from a patriarchal society we have been fighting for many years to dismantle.

Unfortunately, one of the side effects of fighting for choice for women, is that some dimwits choose to uphold the patriarchy.

Sighingly, I accept this is your right.

But don’t come on to a (mostly) feminist forum and start spouting your nonsense like a Temu trad wife and suggesting you’ve hit a nerve because it’s true - you’ve hit a nerve because you are annoying AF.

I personally wouldn’t have it, it’s not for me for my own personal beliefs.

Stepford is that way OP 👉

She’s selling the ‘girlfriend experience’.

We all know what kind of men like to buy that sort of thing - I wouldn’t suggest marrying one.

Can someone post a dictionary?

Wtf is ‘building a life in intention’?

How does one lead without purpose? Are you referring to by to Trump?

And love with purpose. wtf does that mean?

Explore their gifts? What is this utter drivel??!

Hahahaha wtf is "masculine provider energy"

I earn fucking loads, what am I supposed to do with all my money if I don't tip up my half of the bills?!

There is no "room mate dynamic" in my house. Two adults, parents, who are both confident and happy to share responsibilities.

But what about all the men out there who are less capable of earning a high enough salary to have a partner at home not earning money, and all the women who are?

Currently in the UK its near impossible to afford a comfortable life on one salary unless the one salary is very high. Does that mean the many many men out there who don't have the educational qualifications, skills, entrepeneurialism or experience (or sheer luck?) to earn a very high salary, shouldn't have a wife or family? Lots of women earn more than men. I earn a high 6 figure salary, if I limited myself to men who earn plenty more than me so as to have the "financial leadership" you suggest is essential, I wouldn't have much choice.

I don't really get what this "financial leadership" quality is either, in a traditional household where a woman became a housewife, the standard was for her to manage finances, with her husband handing over the pay packet each Friday for her to plan the budget.

I understand a principal that a relationship becomes unbalanced where one party is bearing the greater load, eg both working outside the home but one is doing all the life admin on top. But typically I'd discourage polarising of the roles the way you describe, which leaves lower earners incredibly vulnerable to financial abuse/control. Its much more optimal to give men more opportunity to fulfill their caring responsibilities and step up to share the load in terms of parenting & emotional care giving. Many men relish this role & do it well, my DH is a fabulous hands on Dad and our lives would be so much poorer if we didn't both get to contribute as parents in that way.

I earn fucking loads, what am I supposed to do with all my money if I don't tip up my half of the bills?!
Obviously you need to quit your job so you can lean into your feminine energy instead.

GOSH

I think the model for high earning women is that you can do so in a very traditionally feminine way, as long as your masculine provider holds and directs all that grubby masculine money for you. Hence the behind the scenes abuse of successful or famous women throughout history.

Men who cannot buy a 'real' 'feminine' 'surrendered' woman do without, I suppose. Or make do with whatever they call the rest of us!

Who has told you that people do have to mirror each other?

You seem to be attacking a position no one holds.

And good luck with your contribution to the relationship when you hit menopause. Brain fog, rage and anxiety don’t generally make for particularly soft energy.

So you better have something else up your vag if you don’t want your man providing his energy with intent elsewhere.

" Leadership in a relationship, to me, doesn’t mean control or issuing orders - it means initiative, direction and being able to carry the weight when needed. It looks like someone who steps up, who’s dependable, and who provides a sense of structure that allows the other person to lean into their own strengths"

Why would a grown adult need a leader ? ive never felt I needed to be led anywhere by my partner. What's with the leader thing? And so much guff. It's really weird.

Sounds like you want to be a Trad Wife.

There's nothing wrong with it, but I completely understand this viewpoint.

I love my DD more than anything in this world. But both DH and I said (before we got married, so there was no walking away afterwards) if we didn't naturally have a child we didn't want to go through that to have one.

Simply because of the toll it takes on you physically and mentally. How invasive it feels. We made the decision that children, for us, were entirely up to fate.

I understand people who go through it because they want children more than anything else. And it's great the option is there for them. But it's not for everyone.

Women, you should never cohabit with a man unless you are able and willing to pay 50 per cent of bills. And if 'your man' is as deluded as the OP and insists it's his job to drag a bloody carcase through the door each week and pay the bills, and you're daft enough to go along with it, then put your bill money into a secret - yes, secret, won't be 'permitted - running away account. Which you will need fairly soon.

Is anyone else irritated by these schlocky US views? More and more of them on MN. Attempt to drive women back to the bed and the kitchen, sprogging annually and manufacturing little Elons to go forth and multiply. Sickening.

I find it strange this idea not contributing to bills. My name is joint on the mortgage, of course I'm going to contribute to it!

I'd be quite rightly handed my divorce papers if I was to suggest to my husband, that he works and pays all the bills while I get to keep all my own money!

It's so strange people exist with these mad view points!

I'd be quite rightly handed my divorce papers if I was to suggest to my husband, that he works and pays all the bills while I get to keep all my own money!

Yes but that's the point of those men (like OP), you will be barefoot in the kitchen and won't have any of your own money.
You will be "leaning into your feminine energy" and doing everything for him, until he decides to change you for a new model. In this process, he will of course claim you're not entitled to anything, because you never contributed but were just "sitting at home", and then whine on MRA message boards, that you're living the life of luxury on that 7 quid he has to pay in child support. Seen it a million times.

Speak for yourself. We don't all become a hormonal ragey mess at menopause.
This stereotyping helps no-one

@ThisSereneSnail It has hit a nerve. I’m embarrassed that attitudes like yours still exist. I’m concerned that your philosophy, which sounds like it’s been ripped from a 4Chan thread or the pages of Project2025, will spread like rot in people who haven’t realised yet that feminism isn’t a war that’s won, but one that’s continually being fought, and that there are people like you who’d send us back into the kitchen, loaded up on pep pills, spitting out kids rhythmically to keep their masculine energy happy.

But honestly, I think you’re a man. And I suspect you’re posting stuff like this to gauge the temperature here in the UK for some of the stuff that’s happening in the States right now.