DISCLAIMER: Next month’s topic on GoodWomenProject.com is “Ask A Married Woman.” We’ve received nearly 200 questions from mostly single women, and unfortunately, only about 25 or 30 of these questions will be answered due to the time constraint. However, they’ll be answered in detail by some wildly gracious and experienced married women in a serious manner. In the meantime, I’m going to be taking some of the questions submitted, and answering them in one-liners. Take a deep sip from your coffee mug and let’s get to my rare appearance of Snark.
Question 1: The church I use to attend taught the young ladies that we shouldn’t “want” to get married and “desiring” marriage was wrong… Even sinful. Our man would be found doing ministry at our same church and serving side by side with them. They would become husband material only if approved by the pastor, otherwise they were not good enough. What would you say to this and breaking free of this mentality? What does it mean to be a spiritual leader and what SHOULD we expect from a man? How do we not set our standards too high, without having none at all?
Answer: Leave the church immediately and sign yourself up for therapy.
Question 2: How do you deal with being single before you get married?
Answer As in, “how do you deal with your disease” before you find “the cure?”
Question 3: What are your thoughts on waiting to have children the first year (or three) to bond with your new husband?
Answer: If you want kids right now, you should have them. And if you don’t, you shouldn’t. Stop letting your mother judge you.
Question 4: Was it easy for you to give up your life to get married?
Answer: If you have to give up your life, you are either doing it wrong, or you don’t know what your life is defined by.
Question 5: How forward or obvious should you be if you are interested in a guy? Should you let him know you’re interested? Or just wait until he says/does something?”
Answer: If you wait until everything in your life comes to you, you won’t have it. Be confident and go after the guy you like. Even though some people would like you to think this, being a woman doesn’t disqualify you from vocalizing what you want. .
Fantastic. Maybe more later? I love.
Yessss. Just posted Round 2!!! http://laurennicolelove.com/blog/sex-love/ask-a-married-woman-2
“If you wait until everything in your life comes to you, you won’t have it. Be confident and go after the guy you like. Even though some people would like you to think this, being a woman doesn’t disqualify you from vocalizing what you want.”
Perfect, thank you. Even if this was supposed to be snarky, it’s still true. I feel very comfortable going after what I want, even if it’s a guy, but I feel like I’m not supposed to do that since I’m a girl. I don’t want to wait for the guy to come after me when I’m perfectly capable of starting it myself.
We’re taught from day one, usually, that men are supposed to initiate, and women are always supposed to be the chased/pursued. The downfall of this is that we get so scared of seeming like we’re the one “chasing,” that we feign indifference, for fear of being accused of initiating. Relationships are 50/50, and the best way to end up in a 50/50 relationship, is to get to know one another in a 50/50 manner. This includes speaking up when you’re interested, and initiating 50% of the time. 😉
Golly I miss you, darlin’…. xoxox 🙂
<3 <3 <3
Love this. Glad to know when we finally hang out, I won’t have to mask my sarcasm for first impressions.
Bridesmaids much? 😉
hahahaha please do not mask your sarcasm, ever.
Love this! Lauren’s feelin’ fiesty!
“stop letting your mother judge you” made me almost do a spit-take. i love you so hard. sheesh.
“stop letting your mother judge you” just made my day! Of course, it my case it’s stop letting your mother and your sister judge you. I’m almost 30 and not married (well, I was married, but now not), but just last week my sister told me I needed to get married before my OVARIES DRIED UP.
Amy, recently a DUDE who wanted to date me thought he had the audacity to tell me something similar. He started asking if I wanted to have kids and I was like “um, maybe? I definitely don’t want to consider that before I’m 30” and he said “30? That’s too old! But 26 is prime.”
PRIME. HAHAHAHAHA. My uterus is prime, thanks, buddy!
Needless to say, he didn’t get that date. 😉
Keep laughing at these stories!
Amy,
I think that line must be from secret book our mothers read: “How to make your daughter cringe if she’s unmarried and childless at 30”
Keep your chin up, your doing just fine and are not alone!
Hey, Lauren! I live in a community with a lot of women who read your blog. Recently we’ve been discussing gender roles and dating (basically, question #5.) I wrote a post about it – if you’d like to read it we’d love to hear more of your thoughts! (see link.)
Thanks for writing!
Ooo this is so cool! I can’t see the link though. Can you re-post?
whoops – sorry about that! here’s the link:
http://hopestillfloats.wordpress.com/2012/06/19/to-flirt-or-not-to-flirt/
LOVE.
haha! Loved this. 😉 So glad you’re working through some of the questions this way, I wanna see your–even one-liner–thoughts on ’em! Your answers imply more anyway, so there’s a lot there to learn from.
Ha!! This is so awesome. Please do this more often.
You got it, girlfriend. http://laurennicolelove.com/blog/sex-love/ask-a-married-woman-2
Having children will bond you more to your husband than bonding without children. You have to team up and bond together to fight against the onslaught of what children bring to your life. It takes two to tango in parenthood. Parenting is like landing on the beach at Normandy. After you and your buddy fight to survive on the beach, you’re bonded for life when you make it to the other side.
This is great!!! My favorite… the answer to question 1 and 5.
Hi Lauren!
I would like to second Preston’s comment above about children. I have actually been to Normandy to the beaches…took my breath away-go Preston and Lauren if you can!
I would like to add that I did not get married until I was 32. I was pregnant 4 mos later. I am now 36 and have a 3 and 1 year old. I am one tired mommy! So if you marry in your 30s you may want to start a family sooner than later:). Though I struggled with my singleness during my 20s it did allow me to do a lot of things that I am not able to do now with small children. But as Preston said children have really helped my husband and I learn how to work and communicate with each other and I am glad I waited AND WAITED (grr) for God to bring Chad into my life! Looking forward to reading more Lauren…God bless
Ha, I think I’m becoming immune to the snark. 🙂 This all seemed right on to me!
Lauren, this was delightful. snarky comments make me laugh. thanks for sharing!
Question 2: Thank you. I love you. This was like high school for me. Being 15 and feeling I had to find “THE ONE” before graduation even if no one actually SAID just that…that’s crazy. Being a teenager is broken enough without feeling like something is wrong with you. So glad I’m not in high school anymore.
Question 5: True story. I would tell boys I liked them when I was like 12 and it didn’t go well (although how would it go?) so I quit that and would say NOTHING. Even avoid them if I liked them so they wouldn’t know. Then I grew up and I liked one of my friends, and after realizing it wasn’t going away in five minutes, I told him. He said he wasn’t interested. I moved on and hung out with other guys, but he and I got to be best friends. Six months after I told him that, he asked me out and now we’ve been together a year and a half. You never know how things will play out, but if you say nothing, maybe nothing will play out.
I feel like you’re reading between the lines with serieus quaestions like these. Please don’t treat readers as if they’re stupid, leaving churches and doing other drastic things like the stuff you suggest in your answers is not done easily. I think your answers would be more of use if you’d try to think outside of your own perspective. I love the intent of this series of quaestions, but please change the underlying tone of your replies.
xx Joanna