Good chat, especially about divorce and how it is being treated in the culture right now. Many if not all children of divorce are irrevocably traumatized by it, and it's high time it was given the weight of seriousness it deserves. Embracing divorce or yourself over your kids is weak, contemptible behaviour; it should be shunned.
Stay together guys: your kids depend on it. When you have kids of your own, you see just how much your children learn to adore you both in unique ways. Sundering, breaking, or even risking the spousal relationship in any way can fracture the entire family and create generations of misery. Compromises and sacrifices must be made, the needs of others put first. This is called being an adult, and yes, you can manage it. Generations before us were taught and fed a different message, but those times are gone—we can do better for our children.
I think the Right needs more wholesome messaging like this, and Freya's voice brings it. We have to start believing again in love—not just of the romantic variety, but familial love, too. Though it is rarely spoken of nowadays, familial love far outstrips romantic love in weight, even if the two are inextricably intertwined.
I think I was given a 'different songsheet' to many of my contemporaries because I was brought up in a 3 generation household and (due to my mothers health meaning she was several times in hospital for lengthy periods) my Victorian paternal grandmother (b. 1884) had a large influence on the way I look on relationships. She told me ( as you say) to always think of others first, that a good marriage took a bit of pain to develop but was made stronger by that compromise and that divorce was an admission of failure.
She did also recognise that 'marriages of convenience' when one parent or other died young were often essential - "The love grows afterwards", she would say.
After all, this was a common occurrence with the high maternal death rate in childbirth and high rate of industrial/agricultural accidents. An inspection of one's family history often reveals many examples of this phenomenon.
Thank you both for an informed discussion of recent events many of which an old Boomer like me was not aware of.
I would like to comment on a couple of the issues covered. Firstly, the description of seeing a baby being born. My experience of seeing my first daughter's birth was, I think, the most miraculous thing I have ever seen!
Gross? Ugly? No.
Beautiful. Magical. Amazing. Yes!
The sight of a baby exiting it's 9 month home safe inside it's mother and see it spontaneously take it's first breath is truly miraculous!
The second item is Freya's article on divorce (which I already briefly commented on on Girls)
I was born in 1952 and saw a significant majority of my extended family separating - including my parents in 1967 when I was 15. I think that my age was crucial in my reaction in that I wasn't a young child and was a more independent minded individual. It hurt me. It hurt me a lot. But I was old enough to draw a few conclusions from it -
1. Divorce hurts the people you claimed to love
2. Therefore in choosing a partner be honest with yourself about what you are undertaking : nobody gets everything they want all the time
3. Do not, in any circumstances, marry someone thinking you can change them. You should be accepting this person 'warts and all'
Just a few apparently out of date ideas (they were out of date when I thought them in 1967!) which I'm pleased to hear you young people talking about.
I sometimes wonder if our very sanitized existence these days makes it harder to appreciate nature's beauty as it is, because it seems so foreign when we encounter it.
I have a lot of kids and all of their births have been different, but thankfully none have been traumatic and they are good memories. But my husband and I both have a special fondness for our "unplanned home birth" where he had to catch the baby and do some of the immediate post-birth stuff before the paramedics got there. It was undoubtedly very messy, but it might be one of the best moments of our marriage.
My experience is too unusual since I’m an MD but for both deliveries I was sitting by my wife’s head watching while they pulled the kid out of her abdomen. I’d gone to school with both her anesthesiologist and her obstetrician. She did fine, babies did fine, our sex life was fine after an appropriate recovery period given that she had abdominal surgery.
Pretty sure the best way to have a healthy marriage and sex life after kids is to have had a healthy marriage and sex life before kids.
In the modern age you can’t leave your wife and child alone with nurses and doctors. They both need you there advocating for them against the insanity of the industrial medical complex.
Good chat, especially about divorce and how it is being treated in the culture right now. Many if not all children of divorce are irrevocably traumatized by it, and it's high time it was given the weight of seriousness it deserves. Embracing divorce or yourself over your kids is weak, contemptible behaviour; it should be shunned.
Stay together guys: your kids depend on it. When you have kids of your own, you see just how much your children learn to adore you both in unique ways. Sundering, breaking, or even risking the spousal relationship in any way can fracture the entire family and create generations of misery. Compromises and sacrifices must be made, the needs of others put first. This is called being an adult, and yes, you can manage it. Generations before us were taught and fed a different message, but those times are gone—we can do better for our children.
I think the Right needs more wholesome messaging like this, and Freya's voice brings it. We have to start believing again in love—not just of the romantic variety, but familial love, too. Though it is rarely spoken of nowadays, familial love far outstrips romantic love in weight, even if the two are inextricably intertwined.
Great pod. Looking forward to more from you both.
I think I was given a 'different songsheet' to many of my contemporaries because I was brought up in a 3 generation household and (due to my mothers health meaning she was several times in hospital for lengthy periods) my Victorian paternal grandmother (b. 1884) had a large influence on the way I look on relationships. She told me ( as you say) to always think of others first, that a good marriage took a bit of pain to develop but was made stronger by that compromise and that divorce was an admission of failure.
She did also recognise that 'marriages of convenience' when one parent or other died young were often essential - "The love grows afterwards", she would say.
After all, this was a common occurrence with the high maternal death rate in childbirth and high rate of industrial/agricultural accidents. An inspection of one's family history often reveals many examples of this phenomenon.
Thank you both for an informed discussion of recent events many of which an old Boomer like me was not aware of.
I would like to comment on a couple of the issues covered. Firstly, the description of seeing a baby being born. My experience of seeing my first daughter's birth was, I think, the most miraculous thing I have ever seen!
Gross? Ugly? No.
Beautiful. Magical. Amazing. Yes!
The sight of a baby exiting it's 9 month home safe inside it's mother and see it spontaneously take it's first breath is truly miraculous!
The second item is Freya's article on divorce (which I already briefly commented on on Girls)
I was born in 1952 and saw a significant majority of my extended family separating - including my parents in 1967 when I was 15. I think that my age was crucial in my reaction in that I wasn't a young child and was a more independent minded individual. It hurt me. It hurt me a lot. But I was old enough to draw a few conclusions from it -
1. Divorce hurts the people you claimed to love
2. Therefore in choosing a partner be honest with yourself about what you are undertaking : nobody gets everything they want all the time
3. Do not, in any circumstances, marry someone thinking you can change them. You should be accepting this person 'warts and all'
Just a few apparently out of date ideas (they were out of date when I thought them in 1967!) which I'm pleased to hear you young people talking about.
Once again thanks for the discussion.
I stand by "gnarly" but it's definitely beautiful and magical too.
Agreed. Nature 'in the raw' often is, I think.
I sometimes wonder if our very sanitized existence these days makes it harder to appreciate nature's beauty as it is, because it seems so foreign when we encounter it.
I have a lot of kids and all of their births have been different, but thankfully none have been traumatic and they are good memories. But my husband and I both have a special fondness for our "unplanned home birth" where he had to catch the baby and do some of the immediate post-birth stuff before the paramedics got there. It was undoubtedly very messy, but it might be one of the best moments of our marriage.
My experience is too unusual since I’m an MD but for both deliveries I was sitting by my wife’s head watching while they pulled the kid out of her abdomen. I’d gone to school with both her anesthesiologist and her obstetrician. She did fine, babies did fine, our sex life was fine after an appropriate recovery period given that she had abdominal surgery.
Pretty sure the best way to have a healthy marriage and sex life after kids is to have had a healthy marriage and sex life before kids.
Agreed absolutely.
SO HERE FOR THIS LET'S GOOOOOO
Agreed. Nature in the raw often is, I think.
In the modern age you can’t leave your wife and child alone with nurses and doctors. They both need you there advocating for them against the insanity of the industrial medical complex.
Taylor Lorenze is like a love child of Tipper Gore and Lars Ulrich.